Selections from the works of Jeremy Taylor : with some account of the author and his writings

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al

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LIBRARY .

THE UNIVERSITY
OE CALIFORNIA

SANTA BARBARA

PRESENTED BY

Mr. Robert E. Easton

^^OD LldKAKl

SELECTIONS

FROM THE

WORKS OF JEREMY TAYLOR.

SELECTIONS

FROM THE

WORKS OF JEREMY TAYLOR.

WITH

SOME ACCOUNT OF THE AUTHOR
AND HIS WRITINGS.

BOSTON:

LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY.
1863.

RIVERSIDE, Cambridge:

9TERE0TYPBD AND PRINTED BY H. 0. HOUGHTON.

CONTENTS.

— f—

PAGE

Life of Jeremy Taylor 7

The Day of Judgment 31

Prayer 55

Pardon of Sin 70

Godly Fear 72

Human Weakness 78

Faith 79

Lukewarmness and Zeal 81

The Epicure's Feast 87

Intemperance 98

Marriage 107

The Atheist 131

The Tongue 133

Idle Talk 135

Jesting 138

Common Swearing 140

Flattery 142

Consolation 143

The Spirit of Grace 146

The Decline of Christendom 150

The Glory of God 150

Death-bed Repentance 152

Deceitfulness of the Heart 154

Faith and Patience 162

The Humiliation of Christ 165

Triumphs of Christianity 168

Afflictions of the Church 172

The Righteous Oppressed 174

Real and Apparent Happiness 178

MartjTdom 180

The Progress of Souls 183

vi CONTENTS.

PAGE

The Inexperienced Christian 184

The Sorrows of the Godly 185

The Goodness of God 186

The Danger of Prosperity 189

Mercy and Judgment 190

Primitive Piety 1 94

Growth in Grace 196

Growth in Sin 199

Worldly Possessions 205

Excellence of the Soul 214

The Rewards of Virtue 216

Religion aud Government 218

Hj^pocrisj' 220

Christ's Disciples 222

The Miracles of the Divine Mercy 223

National Adversity 232

Evangelical Righteousness 234

Watchfulness 236

Pity 238

The Hope of Man 239

The Resurrection 240

Resurrection of Sinners 244

The Divine Bounty 245

Sympathy 250

Restraint of the Passions 250

The Soul's Memory 252

Female Piety 253

The Shortness of Life 257

The Miseries of Life 271

Reason and Discretion 277

Charity 280

Time 282

Immoderate Grief. 282

The Ephesian Matron 284

Education 288

Advantages of Sickness 290

Daily Prayer 293

Toleration 294

The Presence of God 296

Quiet Religion 302

The Imitation of Christ 304

SOME ACCOUNT

OF THE LIFE AND WRITINGS OF

JEREMY TAYLOR*

Jeremy Taylor was the son of a barber, and
was born at Cambridfre in the year 1613. He was
brought up in the free-school there, and was ripe
for the university before custom would allow of his
admittance ; but by the time he was thirteen years
old he was entered into Caius College. Had he
lived among the ancient pagans, he had been ush-
ered into the world with a miracle, and swans must
have danced and sung at his birth ; and he must
have been a great hero, and no less than the son of
Apollo, the god of wisdom and eloquence.t

He was a man long before he was of age, and
knew little more of the state of childhood than its
innocency and pleasantness. From the university,
by that time he was Master of Arts, he removed to

* This account consists chiefly of Dr. Rust's Sermon, preached
at Taylor's funeral. For the minuter details the reader is refer-
red to Heber's Life of Taylor.

t Anthony Wood, spcakinjj of his birth, says, " Jeremj' Tay-
lor tumbled into the lap of the muses at Cambridge."

8 LIFE AND WRITINGS

London, and became public lecturer in the church
of St. Paul's, where he preached to the admiration
and astonishment of his auditory, and by his florid
and youthful beauty, and sweet and pleasant air, and
sublime and raised discourses, he made his hearers
take him for some young angel, newly descended
from the visions of glory. The fame of this new
star, that outshone all the rest of the firmament,
quickly came to the notice of the great Archbishop
of Canterbury,* who would needs have him preach
before him, which he performed not less to his won-
der than satisfaction ; his discourse was beyond ex-
ception and beyond imitation : yet the wise prelate
thought him too young ; but the great youth hum-
bly begged his Grace to pardon that fault, and prom-
ised, if he lived, he would mend it. However, the
grand patron of learning and ingeniiity thought it
for the advantage of the world, that such mighty
parts should be afforded better opportunities of study
and improvement than a course of constant preach-
ing would allow of ; and to that purpose he placed
him in All-Souls College, in Oxford ; where love and
admiration still waited upon him : which, so long
as there is any spark of ingenuity in the breasts
of men, must needs be the inseparable attendants of
so extraordinary a worth and sweetness. He had
not been long here, before my Lord of Canterbury
bestowed upon him the rectory of Uppingham in
Rutlandshire, and soon after preferred him to be
chaplain to King Charles the Martyr, of blessed and
immortal memory. Thus were preferments heaped

* Laud.

OF JEREMY TAYLOR. 9

upon him, but still less than his deserts ; and that
not through the fault of his great masters, but be-
cause the amplest honors and rewards were poor
and inconsiderable compared with the greatness of
his worth and merit.

This great man had no sooner launched into the
world, but a fearful tempest arose, and a barbarous
and uimatural war disturbed a long and uninter-
rupted peace and tranquillity, and brought all things
into disorder and confusion. But his religion taught
him to be loyal, and engaged him on his prince's
side, whose cause and quarrel he always owned and
maintained with a great courage and constancy: till
at last he and his little fortune were shipwrecked in
that great hurricane that overturned both Church
and State. This fatal storm cast him ashore in a
private corner of the world, and a tender Providence
shrouded him under her wings, and the prophet was
fed in the wilderness ; and his great worthiness pro-
cured him friends, that supplied him with bread and
necessaries. In this solitude he began to write those
excellent Discourses, which are enough of them-
selves to furnish a library, and will be famous to
all succeeding generations for their greatness of
wit, and profoundness of judgment, and richness of
fimcy, and clearness of expression, and copiousness
of invention, and general usefulness to all the pur-
poses of a Ciiristian. And by these he soon got a
great reputation among all persons of judgment and
indifferency, and his name will grow greater still as
the world grows better and viaser.

When he had spent some years in this retirement,

10 LIFE AND WRITINGS

it pleased God to visit his family with sickness, and
to take to himself the dear pledges of his favor, —
three sons of great hopes and expectations, — within
the space of two or three months : and though he
had learned a quiet submission unto the divine will,
yet the affliction touched him so sensibly, that it
made him desirous to leave the country ; and going
to London, he there met my Lord Conway, a person
of great honor and generosity, who making him a
kind proffer, the good man embraced it; and that
brought him over into Ireland, and settled him at
Portmore, a place made for study and contemplation,
which he, therefore, dearly loved ; and here he wrote
his " Cases of Conscience," a book that is able alone
to give its author immortality.

By this time the wheel of Providence brought
about the king's happy restoration, and there began
a new world, and the Spirit of God moved upon the
face of the waters, and out of a confused chaos
brought forth beauty and order, and all the three
nations were inspired with a new life, and became
drunk with an excess of joy : among the rest this
loyal subject went over to congratulate the prince
and people's happiness, and bear a part in the uni-
versal triumph.

It was not long ere his sacred Majesty began the
settlement of the Church, and the great Doctor Jer-
emy Taylor was resolved upon for the bishopric of
Down and Connor ; and not long after, Dromore was
added to it ; and it was but reasonable that the king
and Church should consider their champion, and re-
ward the pains and sufferings he underwent in the

OF JEREMY TAYLOR. 11

defence of their cause and honor. With what care
and faithfukiess he discharged his office, we are all
his witnesses ; what good rules and directions he
gave his clergy, and how he taught us the practice
of them by his own example. Upon his coming
over bishop, he was made a privy-counsellor ; and
the University of Dublin gave him their testimony
by recommending him for their vice-chancellor :
which honorable office he kept to his dying day.

During his being in this see, he wrote several ex-
cellent discourses, particularly his " Dissuasive from
Popery," which was received by a general approba-
tion ; and a " Vindication " of it from some imper-
tinent cavillers, that pretend to answer books when
there is nothing towards it more than the very title-
page. This great prelate improved his talent with
a mighty industry, and managed his stewardship
rarely well ; and his Master, when he called for his
accounts, found him busy and at his work, and em-
ployed upon an excellent subject, "A Discourse
upon the Beatitudes " ; which, if finished, would
have been of great use to the world, and solve most
of the cases of conscience that occur to a Christian
in all the varieties of states and conditions. But
the all-wise God hath ordained it otherwise, and
hath called home his good servant, to give him a
portion in that blessedness that Jesus Christ hath
promised to all his faithful disciples and followers.

Thus having given you a brief account of his life,
I know you will now expect a character of his per-
son ; but, I foresee, it will befall him as it does all
glorious subjects that are but disparaged by a com-

12 LIFE AND WRITINGS

mendation. One thing I am secure of, that I shall
not be thought to speak hyperboles ; for the subject
can hardly be reached by any expressions ; for he
was none of God's ordinary works, but his endow-
ments were so many, and so great, as really made
him a miracle.

Nature had befriended him much in his constitu-
tion ; for he was a person of most sweet and oblig-
ing humor, of great candor and ingenuity ; and there
was so much of salt and fineness of wit, and pretti-
ness of address, in his familiar discourses, as made
his conversation have all the pleasantness of a com-
edy, and all the usefulness of a sermon. His soul
was made up of harmony ; and he never spake but
he charmed his heai'er, not only with the clearness
of his reason, but all his words, and his very tone
and cadences, were strangely musical.

But that which did most of all captivate and en-
ravish, was, the gayety and richness of fancy ; for
he had much in him of that natural enthusiasm that
inspires all gi'eat poets and orators ; and there was a
generous ferment in his blood and spirits that set his
fancy bravely a-work, and made it swell and teem
and become pregnant to such degrees of luxuriancy
as nothing but the greatness of his wit and judg-
ment could have kept it within due bovmds and
measures.

And, indeed, it was a rare mixture, and a single
instance, hardly to be found in an age : for the great
trier of wits has told us, that there is a peculiar and
several complexion required for wit, and judgment,
and fancy ; and yet you might have found all these

OF JEREMY TAYLOR. 13

in this great personage in their eminency and per-
fection. But that which made his wit and judgment
so considerable, was the largeness and freedom of
his spirit ; for truth is plain and easy to a mind dis-
entangled from superstition and prejudice. He was
one of the Eclectics, a sort of brave philosophers
that Laertius speaks of, that did not addict them-
selves to any particular sect, but ingenuously sought
for truth among all the wrangling schools ; and they
found her miserably torn and rent to pieces, and
parcelled into rags, by the several contending parties,
and so disfigured and misshapen that it was hard to
know her ; but they made a shift to gather up her
scattered limbs, Avhich, as soon as they came to-
gether, by a strange sympathy and connaturalness,
presently united into a lovely and beautiful body.
This was the spirit of this great man ; he weighed
men's reasons and not their names, and was not
scared with the ugly visors men usually put upon
persons they hate and opinions they dislike, — not
affrighted with the anathemas and execrations of an
infallible chair, which he looked upon only as bug-
bears to terrify weak and childish minds. He con-
sidered that it is not likely any one party should
wholly engross truth to themselves ; that obedience
is the only way to true knowledge ; which is an ar-
gument that he has managed rarely well in that
excellent sermon of his, which he calls " Via Intel-
ligentiaj " ; that God always, and only, teaches do-
cible and ingenuous minds, that are willing to hear
and ready to obey according to their light ; that it
is impossible a pure, humble, resigned, God-like

14 LIFE AND WRITINGS

soul should be kept out of heaven, whatever mis-
takes it might be subject to in this state of mortality ;
that the design of heaven is not to fill men's heads
and feed their curiosities, but to better their hearts
and mend their lives. Such considerations as these
made him impartial in his disquisitions, and give a
due allowance to the reasons of his adversary, and
contend for truth, and not for victory.

And now you will easily believe that an ordinary
diligence would be able to make great improvements
upon such a stock of parts and endowments ; but to
these advantages of nature and excellency of his
spirit he added an indefatigable industry, and God
gave a plentiful benediction : for there were very
few kinds of learning but he was a " Mystes," and a
great master in them ; he was a rare humanist, and
hugely versed in all the polite arts of learning; and
had thoroughly concocted all the ancient moralists,
Greek and Roman, poets and orators ; and was not
unacquainted with the refined wits of later ages,
whether French or Italian.

But he had not only the accomplishments of a
gentleman, but so universal were his parts, that they
were proportioned to everything; and though his
spirit and humor were made up of smoothness and
gentleness, yet he could bear with the harshness and
roughness of the schools; and was not unseen in
their subtilties and spinosities, and, upon occasion,
could make them serve his purpose ; and yet, I be-
lieve, he thought many of them very near akin to
the famous Knight de la Mancha, and would make
sport sometimes with the romantic sophistry and

OF JEREMY TAYLOR. 15

fantastic adventures of school-errantry. His skill
was great, both in the civil and canon law, and casu-
istical divinity ; and he was a rare conductor of
souls, and knew how to counsel and to advise, — to
solve difficulties, and determine cases, and quiet
consciences. And he was no novice in Mr. I. S.'s
new science of controversy ; but could manage an
argument and repartees with a strange dexterity ;
he understood what the several parties in Christen-
dom have to say for themselves, and could plead
their cause to better adv^antage than any advocate
of their tribe : and when he had done, he could con-
fute them too, and show that better arguments
than ever they could produce for themselves would
afford no sufficient ground for their fond opinions.

It would be too great a task to pursue his accom-
plishments through the various kinds of literature.
I shall content myself to add only his great acquaint-
ance with the Fathers and ecclesiastical writers, and
the doctors of the first and purest ages both of the
Greek and Latin Church ; which he has made use
of against the Romanists, to vindicate the Church of
England from the challenge of innovation, and prove
her to be truly ancient, catholic, and apostolical.

But religion and virtue is the crown of all other
accomplishments ; and it was the glory of this great
man to be thought a Christian, and whatever you
added to it, he looked upon as a term of diminution ;
and he was a zealous son of the Church of Eng-
land ; but that was because he judged her (and
with great reason) a Church the most purely Chris-
tian of any in the world. In his younger years ho

16 LIFE AND WRITINGS

met with some assaults from popery ; and the high
pretensions of their religious orders were very ac-
commodate to his devotional temper : but he was
always so much master of himself, that he would
never be governed by anything but reason, and the
evidence of truth, which engaged him in the study
of those controversies ; and to how good purpose,
the world is by this time a sufficient M'itness : but
the longer and the more he considered, the worse he
liked the Roman cause, and became at last to cen-
sure them with some severity ; but I confess I have
so great an opinion of his judgment, and the chari-
tableness of his spu'it, that I am afraid he did not
think worse of them than they deserve.

But religion is not a matter of theory and ortho-
dox notions ; and it is not enough to believe aright,
but we must practise accordingly ; and to master
our passions, and to make a right use of that power
that God has given us over our own actions, is a
greater glory than all other accomplishments that
can adorn the mind of man ; and, therefore, I shall
close my character of this great personage with a
touch upon some of those virtues for wliich his
memory will be precious to all posterity. He was a
person of great humility ; and notwithstanding his
stupendous parts, and learning, and eminency of
place, he had nothing in him of pride and humor,
but was courteous and affable, and of easy access,
and would lend a ready ear to the complaints, yea,
to the impertinencies of the meanest persons. His
humility was coupled with an extraordinary piety ;
and, I believe, he spent the greatest part of his time

OF JEREMY TAYLOR. 17

in heaven ; his solemn hours of prayer took up a
considerable portion of his life ; and we are not to
doubt but he had learned of St. Paul to pray con-
tinually ; and that occasional ejaculations, and fre-
quent aspirations and emigrations of his soul after
God, made up the best part of his devotions. But
he was not only a good man Godward, but he was
come to the top of St. Peter's gradation, and to all
his other virtues added a large and diffusive charity :
and whoever compares his plentiful incomes with
the inconsiderable estate he left at his death, will be
easily convinced that charity was steward for a great
proportion of his revenue. But the hungry that he
fed, and the naked that he clothed, and the dis-
tressed that he supplied, and the fatherless that he
provided for, — the poor children that he put to ap-
prentice, and brought up at school, and maintained
at the university, — will now sound a trumpet to that
charity which he dispersed with his right hand, but
would not suffer his left hand to have any knowl-
edge of it.

To sum up all in a few words : this great prelate
had the good-humor of a gentleman, the eloquence
of an orator, the fancy of a poet, the acuteness of a
schoolman, the profoundness of a philosopher, the
wisdom of a chancellor, the sagacity of a prophet,
the reason of an angel, and the piety of a saint ; he
had devotion enough for a cloister, learning enough
for a university, and wit enough for a college of
virtuosi ; and had his parts and endowments been
parcelled out among his poor clergy that he left be-
hind him, it would, perhaps, have made one of the
2

18 LIFE AND WRITINGS

best dioceses in the world. But, alas ! " Our father !
our father ! the horses of our Israel, and the chariot
thereof! " he is gone, and has carried his mantle and
his spirit along with liim up to heaven ; and the
sons of the prophets have lost all their beauty and
lustre, which they enjoyed only from the reflection
of his excellencies, which were bright and radiant
enough to cast a glory upon a whole order of men.
But the sun of this our world, after many attempts
to break through the crust of an earthly body, is at
last swallowed up in the great vortex of eternity,
and there all his maculce are scattered and dis-
solved, and he is fixed in an orb of glory, and shines
among his brethren stars, that, in their several ages,
gave light to the world, and turned many souls unto
righteousness ; and we that are left behind, though
we can never reach his perfections, must study to
imitate his virtues, that we may at last come to sit
at his feet in the mansions of glory.

After a short illness of ten days, this man of ex-
traordinary gifts and attainments finished his earthly
course, on the 13th of August, 1667, at the age of
fifty-five years.

The critical remarks that follow are from the pen
of Bishop Heber.

The comeliness of Taylor's person has been often
noticed, and he himself appears to have been not
insensible of it. Few authors have so frequently
introduced their own portraits, in different characters

OF JEREMY TAYLOR. 19

and attitudes, as ornaments to their printed works.
So far as we may judge from these, he appears to
have been above the middle size, strongly and hand-
somely proportioned, with his hair long and grace-
fully curling on his cheeks, large dark eyes, full of
sweetness, an aquiline nose, and an open and intel-
ligent countenance.

Of Taylor's domestic habits and private character
much is not known, but all which is known is ami-
able. " Love," as well as " admiration," is said to
have " waited on him " in Oxford. In Wales, and
amid the mutual irritation and violence of civil and
religious hostility, we find him conciliating, when a
prisoner, the favor of his keepers, at the same time
that he preserved, imdiminished, the confidence and
esteem of his OAvn party. Laud, in the height of
his power and full-blown dignity ; Charles, in his
deepest reverses ; Hatton, Vaughan, and Conway,
amid the tumults of civil war ; and Evelyn, in the
tranquillity of his elegant retirement ; seem alike to
have cherished his friendship, and coveted his soci-
ety. The same genius which extorted the com-
mendation of Jeanes, for the variety of its research
and the vigor of its argument, was also an object of
interest and affection with the young and rich and
beautiful Katharine Philips ; and few writers, who
have expressed their opinions so strongly, and,
sometimes, so unguardedly as he has done, have
lived and died with so much praise and so little cen-
sure. Much of this felicity may be probably re-
ferred to an engaging appearance and a pleasing
manner ; but its cause must be sought, in a still

20 LIFE AND WRITINGS

greater degree, in the evident kindliness of heart,
which, if the uniform tenor of a man's writings is
any index to his character, must have distinguished
him from most men living ; in a temper, to all ap-
pearance warm, but easily conciliated ; and in that
which, as it is one of the least common, is of all
dispositions the most attractive, not merely a neglect,
but a total forgetfulness of all selfish feeling. It is
this, indeed, which seems to have constituted the
most striking feature of his character. Other men
have been, to judge from their writings and their
lives, to all appearance, as religious, as regular in
their devotions, as diligent in the performance of all
which the laws of God or man require from us ;
but with Taylor his duty seems to have been a de-
light, his piety a passion. His faith was the more
vivid in proportion as his fancy was more intensely
vigorous ; with him the objects of his hope and rev-
erence were scarcely unseen or future ; his imagi-
nation daily conducted him to " diet with gods," and
elevated him to the same height above the world,
and the same nearness to ineffable things, which
Milton ascribes to his allegorical " cherub Contem-
plation."

Of the broader and more general lines of Taylor's
literary character a very few observations may be
sufficient. The greatness of his attainments, and
the powers of his mind, are evident in all his writ-
ings, and to the least attentive of his readers. It is
hard to point out a branch of learning, or of scien-
tific pursuit, to which he does not occasionally al-
lude ; or any author of eminence, either ancient or

OF JEREMY TAYLOR. 21

modern, with whom he does not evince himself ac-
quainted. And it is certain, that, as very few other
writers have equal riches to display, so he is apt to
display his stores with a lavish exuberance which
the severer taste of Hooker or of Barrow would
have condemned as ostentatious, or rejected as cum-
bersome. Yet he is far from a mere reporter of
other men's arguments, — a textuary of fathers and
schoolmen, — who resigns his reason into the hands
of his predecessors, and who employs no other in-
strument for convincing his readers than a length-
ened string of authorities. His familiarity with the
stores of ancient and modem literature is employed
to illustrate more frequently than to establish his
positions ; and may be traced, not so much in direct
citation, (though of this, too, there is, perhaps, more
than sufficient,) as in the abundance of his allusions,
the character of his imagery, and the occurrence of
terms of foreign derivation, or employed in a foreign
and unusual meaning.

It is thus that he more than once refers to obscure
stories in ancient writers, as if they were, of neces-
sity, as familiar to all his readers as himself ; that he
talks of " poor Attilius Aviola," or " the Lybian
lion," that " brake loose into his wilderness and
killed two Roman boys " ; as if the accidents of
which he is speaking had occurred in London a few
weeks before. It is thus that, in warning an Eng-
lish (or a Welsh) auditory against the brief term of
mortal luxury, he enumerates a long list of ancient
dainties, and talks of " the condited bellies of the
scarus," and " drinking of healths by the numeral

22 LIFE AND WRITINGS

letters of Philenium's name." It is thus that one of
his strangest and harshest similes, where he com-
pares an ill-sorted marriage to " going to bed with a
dragon," is the suggestion of a mind familiar with
those lamiee with female faces and extremities like
a serpent, of wliose enticements strange stories are
told, in the old demonologies. And thus that he
speaks of the "justice," instead of the "juice" of
fishes ; of an " excellent " pain ; of the gospel being
preached, not " to the common people," but to
" idiots " ; and of " serpents," (meaning " creeping
things,") devouring our bodies in the grave. It is
this which gives to many of his most striking passages
the air of translations, and which, in fact, may well
lead us to believe, that some of them are indeed the
selected members of different and disjointed classics.
On the other hand, few circumstances can be
named, which so greatly contribute to the richness
of his matter, the vivacity of his style, and the har-
mony of his language, as those copious drafts on all
which is wise, or beautiful, or extraordinary, in an-
cient writers or in foreign tongues ; and the very
singularity and hazard of his plirases has not unfre-
quently a peculiar charm, which the observers of a
tamer and more ordinary diction can never hope to
inspire. One of these archaisms, and a very grace-
ful one, is the introduction of the comparative de-
gree, simply and witliout its contrasted quantity, of
which he has made a very frequent use, but which
he has never employed without producing aa effect
of striking beauty. Thus, he tells us " of a more
healthy sorrow " ; of " the air's looser garment," or

OF JEREMY TAYLOR. 23

" the wilder fringes of the fire " ; which, though in
a style purely English they would be probably re-
placed by positive or superlative epithets, could
hardly suffer this change without a considerable
detraction from the spirit and raciness of the sen-
tence. The same observation may apply to the use
of " prevaricate," in an active sense ; to " the tem-
eration of ruder handling " ; and to many sin)ilai'
expressions, which, if unusual, are at least expres-
sive and sonorous, and which could hardly be re-
placed by the corresponding vernacular phrases
without a loss of brevity or beauty. Of such ex-
pressions as these it is only necessary to observe
that their use, to be effectual or allowable, should be
more discreet, perhaps, and infrequent, than is the
case in the works of Taylor.

I have already noticed the familiarity which he
himself displays, — and which he apparently expected
to find, in an almost equal degree, in his readers or
hearers, — with the facts of history, the opinions of
philosophy, the productions of distant climates, and
the customs of distant nations. Nor, in the allusions
or examples which he extracts from such sources, is
he always attentive to the weight of authority, or
the probability of the fact alleged. The age, in-
deed, in which he lived was, in many respects, a
credulous one. The discoveries Avhich had been
made by the enterprise of travellers, and the un-
skilful and as yet immature efforts of the new phi-
losophy, had extended the knowledge of mankind
just far enough to make them know that much yet
remained uncertain, and that many things were true

24 LIFE AND WRITINGS

which their fathers had held for impossible. Such
absence of skepticism is, of all states of the human
mind, most favorable to the increase of knowledge ;
but for the preservation of truths already acquired,
and the needful separation of truth from falsehood,
it is necessary to receive the testimony of men, how-
ever positive, with more of doubt than Boyle, Wil-
kins, or even Bacon, appear to have been accus-
tomed to exercise.

But Taylor was anything rather than a critical
inquirer into facts (however strange) of history or
philosophy. If such alleged facts suited his pur-
pose, he received them without examination, and
retailed them without scruple ; and we therefore
read in his works of such doubtful or incredible
examples as that of a single city containing fifteen
millions of inhabitants ; of the Neapolitan manna,
which failed as soon as it was subjected to a tax ;
and of the monument " nine furlongs high," which
was erected by Ninus, the Assyrian. Nor in his
illustrations, even where they refer to matters of
daily observation or of undoubted truth, is he al-
ways attentive to accuracy.

" When men sell a mule," he tells us, " they speak
of the horse that begat him, not of the ass that bore
him." It is singular that he should forget that, of
mules, the ass is always the fatlier. What follows
is still more extraordinary, inasmuch as it shows a
forgetfulness of the circumstances of two of the
most illustrious events in the Old Testament. " We
sliould fight," says he, " as Gideon did, with three
hundred hardy brave fellows that would stand

OF JEREMY TAYLOR. 25

against all violence, rather than to make a noise
with rams' horns and broken pitchers, like the men
at the siege of Jericho." Had he thought twice, he
must have recollected that " making a noise " was
at least one principal part of the service required
from Gideon's troops, and that the " broken pitch-
ers " were their property alone, and a circumstance
of which the narrative of the siege of Jericho affords
not the least mention. An occasional occuiTence of
such errors is indeed unavoidable ; and, irrelevant
as some of his iUusti-ations are, and uncertain as
may be the truth of others, there is none, perhaps,
of his readers who would wish those illustrations
fewer, to which his woi'ks owe so much of theu'
force, theu' impressiveness, and their entertainment.
As a reasoner, I do not think him matchless. He is,
indeed, always acute, and, in practical questions,
almost always sensible. His knowledge was so vast,
that on every pomt of discussion he set out with
great advantage, as being familiar with all the neces-
sary preliminaries of the question, and with every
ground or argument which had been elicited on
either side by former controversies. But his own
understanding was rather inventive than critical.
He never failed to find a plausible argument for any
opinion which he himself entertained ; he was as
ready with plausible objections to every argument
which might be advanced by his adversaries ; and
he was completely acquainted with the whole detail
of controversial attack and defence, and of every
weapon of eloquence, irony, or sarcasm, which was
most proper to persuade or to silence. But his own

26 LIFE AND WRITINGS

views were sometimes indistinct, and often hasty.
His opinions, therefore, though always honest and
ardent, he had sometimes occasion, in the course of
his life, to change ; and instances have been already
pointed out, not only where his reasoning is incon-
clusive, but Avhere positions ardently maintained in
some of his Avritings are doubted or denied in others.
But it should be remembered how much he wrote
during a life in itself not long, and in its circum-
stances by no means favorable to accurate research
or calm reasoning. Nor can it be a subject of sur-
prise that a poor and oppressed man should be
sometimes hurried too far in opposition to his per-
secutors, or that one who had so little leisure for the
correction of his works should occasionally be found
to contradict or repeat himself.

I have already had occasion to point out the ver-
satility of his talents, which, though uniformly ex-
erted on subjects appropriate to his profession, are
distinguished, where such weapons are needed, by
irony and caustic humor, as well as by those milder
and sublimer beauties of style and sentiment which
are his more famiHar and distinguishing character-
istics. Yet to such weapons he has never recourse
wantonly or rashly. Nor do I recollect any instance
in which he has employed them in the cause of pri-
vate or personal, or even polemical hostility, or any
occasion where their fullest severity was not justi-
fied and called for by crimes, by cruelty, by inter-
ested superstition, or base and sordid hypocrisy.
His satire was always kept in check by the depth
and fervor of his religious feelings, his charity, and

OF JEREMY TAYLOR. 27

his humility. It is on devotional and moral subjects,
however, that the peculiar character of his mind is
most, and most successfully, developed. To this
service he devotes his most glowing language ; to
this his aptest illustrations ; his thoughts, and his
words at once burst into a flame, when touched by
the coals of this altar ; and whether he describes the
duties, or dangers, or hopes of man, or the mercy,
power, and justice of the Most High, — whether he
exhorts or instructs his brethren, or oifers up his
supplications in their behalf to the common Father
of all, — his conceptions and his expressions belong
to the loftiest and most sacred description of poetry,
of which they only want, what they cannot be said
to need, the name and the metrical arrangement.

It is this distinctive excellence, still more than the
other qualifications of learning and logical acute-
ness, which has placed him, even in that age of
gigantic talent, on an eminence superior to any of
his immediate contemporaries ; which has exempted
him from the comparative neglect into which the
dry and repulsive learning of Andrews and Sander-
son has fallen ; which has left behind the acute-
ness of Hales, and the imaginative and copious elo-
quence of Bishop Hall, at a distance hardly less than
the cold elegance of Clarke, and the dull good sense
of Tillotson ; and has seated him, by the almost
unanimous estimate of posterity, on the same lofty
elevation with Hooker and with Barrow.

Of such a triumvirate, who shall settle the prece-
dence ? Yet it may, perhaps, be not far from the
truth, to observe, that Hooker claims the foremost

28 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF JEREMY TAYLOR.

rank in sustained and classic dignity of style, in
political and pragmatical wisdom ; that to Barrow
the praise must be assigned of the closest and the
clearest views, and of a taste the most controlled
and chastened ; but that in imagination, in interest,
in that which more properly and exclusively deserves
the name of genius, Taylor is to be placed before
either. The first awes most, the second convinces
most, the third persuades and delights most ; and
(according to the decision of one * whose own rank
among the ornaments of English literature yet re-
mains to be determined by posterity) Hooker is the
object of our reverence, Barrow of our admiration,
and Jeremy Taylor of our love.

* Dr. Parr.

SELECTIONS

FROM

JEREMY TAYLOR.

SELECTIONS.

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

"YT'IRTUE and vice are so essentially distin-
^ guished, and the distinction is so necessary
to be observed in order to the well-being of
men in private and in societies, that, to divide
them in themselves, and to separate them by
sufficient notices, and to distinmiish them bv
rewards, hath been designed by all laws,
by the sayings of wise men, by the order of
things, by their proportions to good or evil.
And the expectations of men have been framed
accordingly ; that \artue may have a proper
seat in the will and in the affections, and may
become amiable by its own excellency and its
appendant blessing ; and that vice may be as
natural an enemy to a man, as a wolf to the
lamb, and as darkness to light, — destrvictive of
its being, and a contradiction of its nature.
But it is not enough that all the world hath
armed itself against vice, and, by all that is
wise and sober among men, hath taken the

32 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

part of virtue, adorning it with glorious appel-
latives, encouraging it by rewards, entertaining
it by sweetness, and commanding it by edicts,
fortifying it with defensatives, and twining with
it in all artificial compliances. All this is short
of man's necessity ; for this will, in all modest
men, secure their actions in theatres and high-
ways, in markets and churches, before the eye
of judges, and in the society of witnesses : but
the actions of closets and chambers, the desio-ns
and thoughts of men, their discourses in dark
places, and the actions of retirements and of
the night, are left indifferent to Aartue or to
vice : and of these, as man can take no cocf-
nizance, so he can make no coercitive ; and
therefore above one half of human actions is
by the laws of man left unregarded and un-
provided for. And besides this, there are some
men who are bigger than laws, and some are
bigger than judges ; and some judges have
lessened themselves by fear and cowardice, by
bribery and flattery, by iniquity and compli-
ance; and where they have not, yet they have
notices but of few causes. And there are
some sins so popular and universal, that to
punish them is either impossible or intolerable ;
and to question such, would betray the weak-
ness of the public rods and axes, and represent
the sinner to be stronger than the power that
is appointed to be his bridle. And after all

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT. 83

this, we find sinners so prosperous that they
escape, so potent that they fear not ; and sin is
made safe when it grows great,

Facere omnia ssev^

Non impun6 licet, nisi dum facis

and innocence is oppressed, and the poor cries,
and he hath no helper, and he is oppressed,
and he wants a patron. And for these and
many other concurrent causes, if you reckon
all the causes that come before all the judica-
tories of the world, though the litigious are too
many, and the matters of instance are intricate
and numerous, yet the personal and criminal
are so few, that of two thousand sins that cry
aloiid to God for vengeance, scarce two are
noted by the public eye, and chastised by the
hand of justice. It must follow from hence,
that it is but reasonable, for the interest of
virtue and the necessities of the world, that the
private should be judged, and virtue should be
tied upon the spirit, and the poor should be
relieved, and tlie oppressed should appeal, and
the noise of widows should be heard, and the
saints should stand upright, and the cause that
was ill-judged should be judged over again, and
t^Tants should be called to account, and our
thoughts should be examined, and our secret
actions ^^iewed on all sides, and the infinite
number of sins which escape here should not
escape finally. And therefore God hath so
3

34 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

ordained it, that there shall be a day of doom,
wherein all that are let alone by men shall be
questioned by God, and every word and every
action shall receive its just recompense of re-
ward. " For we must all appear before the
judgment-seat of Christ, that every one may
receive the things done in his body, according
to that he hath done, whether it be good or
bad."

" The things done in the body," so we com-
monly read it ; the things proper or due to
the body, so the expression is more apt and
proper ; for not only what is done by the body,
but even the acts of abstracted understanding
and volition, the acts of reflection and choice,
acts of self-love and admiration, and whatever
else can be supposed the proper and peculiar
act of the soul or of the spirit, is to be ac-
counted for at the day of judgment : and even
these may be called " the things done in the
body," because these are the acts of the man
in the state of conjunction with the body.
The words have in them no other diflFiculty or
variety, but contain a great truth of the big-
gest interest, and one of the most material
constitutive articles of the whole religion, and
the greatest endearment of our duty in the
whole world. Things are so ordered by the
great Lord of all the creatures', that what-
soever we do or suffer shall be called to.ac-

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT. 35

count, and this account shall be exact, and the
sentence shall be just, and the rewai'd shall
be great ; all the e^als of the world shall be
amended, and the injustices shall be repaid,
and the divine Providence shall be vindicated,
and virtue and vice shall forever be remarked
by their separate dwellings and reAvards.

We will consider the persons that are to be
judged, with the circumstances of our advan-
tages or our sorrows. " We must all appear,"
even you, and I, and all the world ; kings and
priests, nobles and learned, the crafty and the
easy, the wise and the foolish, the rich and the
poor, the prevailing tyrant and the oppressed
party, shall all appear to receive their symbol.
And this is so far from abating anything of its
terror and our dear concernment, that it much
increases it : for, although concerning precepts
and discourses we are apt to neglect in par-
ticular what is recommended in general, and
in incidencies of mortality and sad events, the
singularity of the chance heightens the appre-
hension of the evil : yet it is so by accident,
and only in regard of our imperfection ; it be-
ing an effect of self-love, or some little creep-
ing envy which adheres too often to the un-
fortunate and miserable ; or else because the
sorrow is apt to increase, by being apprehended
to be a rare case, and a singular unworthiness
in him who is afflicted, otherwise than is com-

36 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

mon to the sons of men, companions of his sin,
and brethren of his nature, and partners of his
usual accidents. Yet in final and extreme
events, the multitude of sufferers does not les-
sen, but increase the sufferings ; and when the
first day of judgment happened, that, I mean,
of the universal deluge of waters upoii the old
world, the calamity swelled like the flood, and
every man saw his friend perish, and the neigh-
bors of his dwelling, and the relatives of his
house, and the sharers of his joys, and yester-
day's bride, and the new-born heir, the priest
of the family, and the honor of the kindred,
all dying or dead, drenched in water and the
divine vengeance ; and then they had no place
to flee unto, no man cared for their souls ; they
had none to go unto for counsel, no sanctuary
high enough to keep them from the vengeance
that rained down from heaven. And so it
shall be at the day of judgment, when that
world and this, and all that shall be born here-
after, shall pass through the same Red Sea,
and be all baptized with the same fire, and be
involved in the same cloud, in which shall
be thunderings and terrors infinite. Every
man's fear shall be increased by his neigh-
bor's shrieks ; and the amazement that all the
world shall be in, shall unite as the sparks of a
raging furnace into a globe of fire, and roll
upon its own principle, and increase by direct

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT. 37

appearances, and intolerable reflections. He
that stands in a churchyard in the time of a
great plague, and hears the passing-bell perpet-
ually tellino; the sad stories of death, and sees
crowds of infected bodies pressing to their
graves, and others sick and tremulous, and
death dressed up in all the images of sorrow
round about him, is not supported in his spirit
by the variety of his sorrow. And at dooms-
day, when the terrors are universal, besides
that it is in itself so much greater, because it
can aftright the whole world, it is also made
greater by communication and a sorrowful in-
fluence ; grief being then strongly infectious
when there is no variety of state, but an entire
kingdom of fear ; and amazement is the king
of all our passions, and all the world its sub-
jects. And that shriek must needs be terrible,
when millions of men and women at the same
instant shall fearfully cry out, and the noise
shall mingle with the trumpet of the archangel,
Avith the thunders of the dying and groaning
heavens, and the crack of the dissolving world ;
when the whole fabric of nature shall shake
into dissolution and eternal ashes. But this
general consideration may be heightened with
four or five circumstances.

1. Consider what an infinite multitude of
angels and men and women shall then appear.
It is a huge assembly, when the men of one

38 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

kingdom, the men of one age in a single prov-
ince, are gathered together into heaps and
confusion of disorder. But then all kingdoms
of all ages, all the armies that ever mustered,
all the world that Augustus Caesar taxed, all
those hundreds of millions that were slain in
all the Roman wars from Numa's time till Italy
was broken into principalities and small exar-
chates ; all these, and all that can come into
numbers, and that did descend from the loins
of Adam, shall at once be represented. To
which account if we add the armies of heaven,
the nine orders of blessed spirits, and the in-
finite numbers in every order, we may sup-
pose the numbers fit to express the majesty of
that God, and terror of that Judge, who is the
Lord and Father of all that unimaginable mul-
titude. Erit terror ingens tot simul tantorumque
populoriim*

2. In this great multitude we shall meet all
those who by their example and their holy
precepts have, like tapers, enkindled with a
beam of the sun of righteousness, enlightened
us, and taught us to walk in the paths of jus-
tice. There we shall see all those good men
whom God sent to preach to us, and recall us
from human follies and inhuman practices ; and
when we espy the good man, that chid us for
our last drunkenness or adulteries, it shall then

* Florus.

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT. 39

also be remembered, how we mocked at coun-
sel, and were civilly modest at the repi^oof, but
laughed when the man was gone, and accepted
it for a religious compliment, and took our
leaves, and went and did the same again. But
then things shall put on another face, and that
we smiled at here, and slighted fondly, shall
then be the greatest terror in the world ; men
shall feel that they once laughed at their own
destruction, and rejected health, when it was
offered by a man of God upon no other condi-
tion but that they would be wise, and not be
in loA^e with death. Then they shall perceive,
that, if they had obeyed an easy and a sober
counsel, they had been partners of the same
felicity which they see so illustrious upon the
heads of those preachers whose work is with
the Lord, and who by their life and doctrine
endeavored to snatch the soul of their friend
or relative from an intolerable misery. But
he that sees a crown put upon their heads that
give good counsel, and preach holy and severe
sermons with designs of charity and piety, will
also then perceive that God did not send
preachers for nothing, on trifling errands and
without regard ; but that work, which he
crowns in them, he purposed should be effec-
tive to us, persuasive to the understanding, and
active upon our consciences. Good preach-
ers by their doctrine, and all good men by

40 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

their lives, are the accusers of the disobedient ;
and they shall rise up from their seats, and
judge and condemn the follies of those who
thought their piety to be want of courage, and
their discourses pedantical, r.nd their reproofs
the priest's trade, but of no signification, be-
cause they preferred moments before eternity.
3. There in that great assembly shall be
seen all those converts, who, upon easier terms,
and fewer miracles, and a less experience, and
a younger grace, and a seldomer preaching,
and more unlikely circumstances, have suffered
the work of God to prosper upon their spirits,
and have been obedient to the heavenly call-
ing. There shall stand the men of NincA'-eh,
and they shall stand upright in judgment, for
they at the preaching of one man in a less
space than forty days returned unto the Lord
their God ; but we have heard him call all our
lives, and like the deaf adder stopped our ears
against the voice of God's servants, charm they
never so wisely. There shall appear the men
of Caperiiaum, and the Queen of the South,
and the men of Berea, and the first fruits of
the Christian Church, and the holy martyrs,
and shall proclaim to all the world, that it was
not impossible to do the work of grace in the
midst of all our weaknesses, and accidental
disadvantages ; and that the obedience of faith,
and the labor of love, and the contentions of

TEE DAY OF JUDGMENT. 41

chastity, and the severities of temperance and
self-denial, are not such insuperable mountains,
but that an honest and sober person may per-
form them in acceptable degrees, if he have
but a ready ear, and a willing mind, and an
honest heart. And this scene of honest per-
sons shall make the divine judgment upon
sinners more reasonably and apparently just,
in passing upon them the horrible sentence ;
for why cannot we as well serve God in peace,
as others served him in war ? Why cannot we
love him as well, when he treats us sweetly,
and gives us health and plenty, honors our fair
fortunes, reputation, or contentedness, quietness
and peace, as others did upon gibbets and un-
der axes, in the hands of tormentors and in hard
wildernesses, in nakedness and poverty, in the
midst of all evil things and all sad discomforts ?
Concerning this no answer can be made.

4. But there is a worse sight than this yet,
which, in that great assembly, shall distract our
sight and amaze owe spmts. There men shall
meet the partners of their sins, and them that
drank the round, when they crowned their
heads with folly and forgetfulness, and their
cups with wine and noises. There shall ye
see that poor, perishmg soul, whom thou didst
tempt to adultery and wantonness, to dnmken-
ness or peijury, to rebellion or an evil interest,
by power or craft, by witty discourses or deep

42 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

dissembling, by scandal or a snare, by evil
example or pernicious counsel, by malice or
unwariness ; and when all tins is summed up,
and from the variety of its particulars is drawn
into an uneasy load and a formidable sum, pos-
sibly we may find sights enough to scare all
our confidences, and arguments enough to press
our evil souls into the sorrows of a most in-
tolerable death. For, however we make now
but light accounts and evil proportions concern-
ing it, yet it will be a feai-fiil circumstance of
appearing, to see one, or two, or ten, or twenty
accursed souls, despairing, miserable, infinitely
miserable, roaring and blaspheming, and fear-
fiiUy cursing thee as the cause of its eternal
sorrows. Thy lust betrayed and rifled her
weak, unguarded innocence ; thy example made
thy servant confident to lie, or to be perjured ;
thy society brought a third into intemperance
and the disguises of a beast : and when thou
seest that soul, with whom thou didst sin,
dragged into hell, well mayest thou fear to
drink the dregs of thy intolerable potion. And
most certainly, it is the greatest of evils to
destroy a soul, for whom the Lord Jesus died,
and to undo that grace which our Lord pur-
chased with so much sweat and blood, pains,
and a mighty charity. And because very many
sins are sins of society and confederation, —
such are fornication, drunkenness, bribery, sim-

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT. 43

onj, rebellion, schism, and many others, — it
is a hard and a weighty consideration, what
shall become of any one of us, who have
tempted our brother or sister to sin and death.
For though God hath spared our life, and they
are dead, and their debt-books are sealed up till
the day of account ; yet the mischief of our
sin is gone before us, and it is like a murder,
but more execrable : the soul is dead in tres-
passes and sins, and sealed up to an eternal
sorrow ; and thou shalt see, at doomsday, what
damnable uncharitableness thou hast done.
That soul that cries to those rocks to cover her,
if it had not been for thy perpetual temptations,
might have followed the Lamb in a white robe ;
and that poor man, that is clothed with shame
and flames of fire, would have shined in gloiy,
but that thou didst force him to be partner of
the baseness. And who shall pay for this loss ?
A soul is lost by thy means ; thou hast defeated
the holy purposes of the Lord's bitter passion
by thy impurities ; and what shall happen to
thee, by whom thy brother dies eternally ?

Of all the considerations that concern this
part of the horrors of doomsday, nothing can
be more formidable than this, to svich whom it
does concern : and truly it concerns so many,
and amongst so many perhaps some persons
are so tender, that it might affright their hopes,
and discompose their industries and spiritual

44 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

labors of repentance ; but that oiu* most merci-
ful Lord hath, in the midst of all the fearful
circumstances of his second coming, interwo-
ven this one comfort relating to this, which to
my sense seems the most fearful and killing cir-
cumstance : " Two shall be crrindins; at one
mill ; the one shall be taken, and the other left :
two shall be in a bed ; the one shall be taken,
and the other left " ; that is, those who are con-
federate in the same fortunes, and interests, and
actions, may yet have a different sentence ; for
an early and an active repentance will wash off
this account, and put it upon the tables of the
cross : and though it ouo;ht to make us diligent
and careful, charitable and penitent, hugely
penitent, even so long as we live ; yet when
we shall appear together, there is a mercy
that shall there separate us, who sometimes
had blended each other in a common crime.
Blessed be the mercies of God, who hath so
carefully provided a fruitful shower of grace,
to refresh the miseries and dangers of the
greatest part of mankind. Thomas Aquinas
was used to beg of God, that he might never
be tempted from his low fortune to prelacies
and dignities ecclesiastical ; and that his mind
might never be discomposed or polluted with
the love of any creature ; and that he might,
by some instrument or other, understand the
state of his deceased brother : and the story

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT. 45

says, that he was heard in all. In him it was
a great curiosity, or the passion and imperti-
nencies of a useless charity to search after him,
unless he had some other personal concernment
than his relation of kindred. But truly, it
would concern very many to be solicitous con-
cerning; the event of those souls, with whom
we have mingled death and sin ; for many of
those sentences, which have passed and decreed
concerning our departed relatives, will concern
us dearly, and we are bound in the same
bundles, and shall be thrown into the same
fires, unless we repent for our own sms, and
double our sorrows for their damnation.

5. We may consider that this mfinite mul-
titude of men and women, angels and devils,
is not ineffective as a number in Pythagoras's
tables, but must needs have mfluence upon
every spirit that shall there appear : for the
transactions of that court are not like orations
spoken by a Grecian orator in the circles of
his people, heard by them that crowd nearest
him, or that sound limited by the circles of air,
or the enclosure of a wall ; but everything is
represented to every person. And then let it
be considered, when thy shame and secret
turpitude, thy midnight revels and secret hy-
pocrisies, thy lustful thoughts and treacherous
designs, thy falsehood to God and startings
from thy holy promises, thy follies and mipicties,

46 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

shall bo laid open before all tlie world, and
that then shall bo spoken by the trumpet of an
archangel vipon the house-top, the highest bat-
tlements of heaven, all those filthy words and
lewd circumstances which thou didst act se-
cretly, thou wilt find that thou wilt have rea-
son strangely to be ashamed. All the wise
men in the world shall know how vile thou
hast been ; and then consider with what con-
fusion of face wouldst thou stand in the pres-
ence of a good man and a severe, if peradven-
ture he should suddenly draw thy curtain, and
find thee in the sins of shame and lust ; it must
be infinitely more, when God and all the angels
of heaven and earth, all his holy myriads, and
all his redeemed saints, shall stare and wonder
at thy impurities and follies.

I have read a story, that a young gentleman,
being passionately by his mother dissuaded from
entering into the severe courses of a religious
and single life, broke from her importunity by
saying, " Volo servare animam meam " ; I am
resolved by all means to save my soul. But
when he had undertaken a rule with passion,
he performed it carelessly and remissly, and
was but lukewarm in his religion, and quickly
proceeded to a melancholy and wearied spirit,
and from thence to a sickness and the neigh-
borhood of death : but, falling into an agony
and a fantastic vision, dreamed that he saw

TEE DAY OF JUDGMENT. 47

himself summoned before God's angry tlirone,
and from thence hurried into a place of tor-
ments, where espying his mother, full of scorn
she upbraided him with his former answer, and
asked him, " Why he did not save his soul bv
all means, according as he undertook ? " But
when the sick man awakened and recovered,
he made his words good indeed, and prayed
frequently, and fasted severely, and labored
humbly, and conversed charitably, and morti-
fied himself severely, and refused such secular
solaces which other good men received to re-
fresh and sustain their infirmities ; and gave no
other account to them that asked him but this :
" If I could not, in my ecstasy or dream, en-
dure my mother's upbraiding my follies and
weak religion, how shall I be able to suffer,
that God should redargue me at doomsday,
and the angels reproach my lukewarmness, and
the devils aggravate my sins, and all the saints
of God deride my foUies and hypocrisies ? "

The effect of that man's consideration may
serve to actuate a meditation in every one of
us : for we shall all be at that pass, that unless
our shame and sorrows be cleansed by a timely
repentance, and covered by the robe of Christ,
we shall suffer the anger of God, the scorn of
saints and angels, and our own shame in the
general assembly of all manldnd. This argu-
ment is most considerable to them who are

48 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

tender of their precious name, and sensible of
honor ; if they rather would choose death than
a disgrace, poverty rather than shame, let them
remember that a sinful life will brino; them to
an intolerable shame at that day, when all that
is excellent in heaven and earth shall be sum-
moned as witnesses and parties m a fearful
scrutiny.

The sum is this : all that are bom of Adam
shall appear before God and his Christ ; and
all the innumerable companies of angels and
devils shall be there : and the wicked shall be
affrighted with everything they see ; and there
they shall see those good men, that taught them
the ways of life, and all those evU persons,
whom themselves have tempted into the ways
of death, and those who were converted upon
easier terms ; and some of these shall shame
the wicked, and some shall curse them, and
some shall upbraid them, and all shall amaze
them.

The majesty of the Judge, and the terrors
of the judgment, shall be spoken aloud by the
immediate forerunning accidents, which shall
be so great violences to the old constitutions
of nature, that it shall break her very bones,
and disorder her till she be destroyed. Saint
Jerome relates out of the Jews' books, that
their Doctors use to account fifteen days of
prodigy immediately before Christ's coming.

THE DAT OF JUDGMENT. 49

and to every day assign a wonder, any one
of wliich, if we sliould cliance to see in the
days of our flesh, it would afli'ight us into the
like thoughts which the old world had when
they saw the comiti'ies round about them cov-
ered with water and the divine vengeance ; or
as those poor people near Adria, and the Medi-
terranean Sea, when their houses and cities
are entermg uito graves, and the bowels of
the earth rent with convulsions and horrid
tremblings. The sea, they say, shall rise fif-
teen cubits above the highest mountains, and
thence descend mto hollowness, and a pro-
digious drought ; and when they are reduced
again to their usual proportions, then aU the
beasts and creeping things, the monsters and
the usual inhabitants of the sea, shall be gath-
ered together, and make fearful noises to dis-
tract mankind. The bh'ds shall mourn and
change their songs into threnes and sad ac-
cents. Rivers of fire shall rise from east to
west, and the stars shall be rent into threads
of light, and scatter like the beards of comets.
Then shall be fearful earthquakes, and the
rocks shall rend in pieces, the trees shall dis-
til blood, and the mountains and fairest struc-
tvu-es shall return into their primitive dust.
The wild beasts shall leave their dens, and
come into the companies of men, so that you
shall hardly tell how to call them, herds of

50 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

men, or congregations of beasts. Then shall
the graves open and give up their dead ; and
those which are alive in nature and dead in
fear, shall be forced fi'om the rocks whither
they went to hide them, and fi'om caverns of
the earth, where they would fain have been
concealed ; because their retirements are dis-
mantled, and their rocks are broken into wider
ruptures, and admit a strange light into their
secret bowels ; and the men being forced
abroad into the theatre of mighty horrors,
shall nm up and down distracted and at their
wits' end ; and then some shall die, and some
shall be changed.

We may guess at the severity of the Judge
by the lesser strokes of that judgment, which
he is pleased to send upon sinners in this
world, to make them afraid of the horrible
pains of doomsday : I mean the torments of
an unquiet conscience, the amazement and
confusions of some sins and some persons.
For I have sometimes seen persons surprised
in a base action, and taken in the circum-
stances of a crafty theft, and secret injustices,
before their excuse was ready ; they have
changed their color, their speech hath fal-
tered, their tongue stammered, their eyes did
wander and fix nowhere, till shame made
them sink into their hollow eyepits, to retreat
from the images and circumstances of discov-

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT. 51

ery ; their "wdts are lost, their reason useless,
the whole order of the soul is discomposed,
and they neither see, nor feel, nor tliink, as
they used to do, but they are broken into
disorder by a stroke of damnation and a lesser
stripe of hell. But then if you come to observe
a guilty and a base murderer, a condemned
traitor, and see him harassed first by an evil
conscience, and then pulled in pieces by the
hangman's hooks, or broken upon sorrows and
the wheel, we may then guess (as well as we
can in this life) what the pains of that day
shall be to accui'sed souls. But those we
shall consider afterwards in their proper scene ;
now only we are to estimate the severity of
our Judge by the mtolerableness of an evil
conscience. If guilt will make a man despair,
and despair will make a man mad, confounded
and dissolved in all the regions of his senses
and more noble faculties, that he shall neither
feel, nor hear, nor see anything but spectres
and illusions, devils and frightful dreams, and
hear noises, and shriek fearfully, and look pale
and distracted, like a hopeless man from the
horrors and confusions of a lost battle upon
which all his hopes did stand, then the wicked
must at the day of judgment expect strange
things and fearful, and such now which no
language can express, and then no patience
can endure.

62 THE DAT OF JUDGMENT.

The Lord shall judge concernmg those judg-
ments which men here make of things below ;
and the fighting men shall perceive the noise
of drmikards and fools, that cried him up for
daring to kill his brother, to have been evil
principles ; and then it will be declared by-
strange effects, that wealth is not the greatest
fortune ; and ambition was but an ill counsel-
lor ; and to lie for a good cause was no piety ;
and to do evil for the glory of God was but an
ill worshipping him ; and that good-nature was
not well employed, when it spent itself in vi-
cious company and evil compliances ; and that
piety was not softness and want of courage ;
and that poverty ought not to have been con-
temptible ; and the cause that is unsuccessful is
not therefore evil ; and what is folly here shall
be wisdom there. Then shall men curse their
evil guides, and their accursed superinduced
necessities, and the evil guises of the world ;
and then when silence shall be found inno-
cence, and eloquence in many instances con-
demned as criminal ; when the poor shall reign,
and generals and tyrants shall lie low in hor-
rible regions ; when he that lost all shall find
a treasure, and he that spoiled him shall be
found naked and spoiled by the destroyer ;
then we shall find it true that we ought here
to have done what oxxx: Judge, our blessed
Lord, shall do there ; that is, take our meas-

THE DAT OF JUDGMENT. 58

Tires of good and evil by the severities of the
word of God, by the sermons of Christ, and
the four Gospels, and by the Epistles of St.
Paul, by justice and charity, by the laws of
God and the laws of wise princes and repub-
lics, by the rules of nature and the just pro-
portions of reason, by the examples of good
men and the proverbs of wise men, by sever-
ity and the rules of discipline ; for then it
shall be, that truth shall I'ide in triumph, and
the holiness of Christ's sermons shall be mani-
fest to all the world ; that the word of God
shall be advanced over all the discourse of
men, and " wisdom shall be justified by aU
her children."

The devil shall accuse " the brethren," that
is, the saints and servants of God, and shall tell
concerning their foUies and infirmities, the sins
of their youth and the weakness of their age,
the imperfect grace and the long schedule
of omissions of duty, their scruples and their
fears, their diffidences and pusillanimity, and
all those things wdiich themselves by strict ex-
amination find themselves guilty of and have
confessed, aU their shame and the matter of
their sorrows, their evil intentions and their
little plots, their carnal confidences and too
fond adherences to the things of this world,
their indulgence and easiness of government,
their wilder joys and fi'eer meals, their loss of

54 THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

time and their too forward and apt compliances,
their trifling arrests and httle peevishnesses,
the mixtures of tlie world with the things of
the spirit, and all the incidences of humanity
he will bring forth, and aggravate them by the
circumstance of ingratitude, and the breach of
promise, and the evacuating of their holy pur-
poses, and breaking their resolutions, and rifling
their vows. And all these things being drawn
into an entire representment, and the bills clog-
ged by numbers, will make the best men in the
world seem foul and unhandsome, and stained
with the characters of death and evil dishonor.
But for these there is appointed a defender ;
the Holy Spirit, that maketh intercession for
us, shall then also interpose, and against all
these things shall oppose the passion of our
blessed Lord, and upon all their defects shall
cast " the robe of his righteousness " ; and the
sins of their youth shall not prevail so much as
the repentance of their age ; and their omissions
be excused by probable intervening causes ;
and their little escapes shall appear single and
in disunion, because they were always kept
asunder by penitential prayers and sighings,
and their seldom returns of sin by their daily
watchfulness, and their often infirmities by the
sincerity of their souls, and their scruples by
their zeal, and their passions by their love, and
all by the mercies of God and the sacrifice

PR A YER. 55

wliich their Judge offered, and the Holy Spirit
made effective by daily graces and assistances.

PRAYER.

T KNOW not which is the greater wonder,
-*- either that prayer, which is a duty so easy
and facile, so ready and adapted to the powers
and skill and opportunities of every man, should
have so great effects, and be productive of such
mighty blessings ; or, that we should be so un-
willing to use so easy an instrument of procur-
ing so much good. The first declares God's
goodness, but this publishes man's folly and
weakness, who finds in himself so much diffi-
culty to perform a condition so easy and full
of advantage. But the order of this felicity is
knotted like the foldings of a serpent ; all those
parts of easmess which invite us to do the duty
are become like the joints of a bulrush, not
bendings, but consolidations and stiffenings ;
the very facility becomes its objection, and in
every of its stages we make or find a huge
uneasiness. At first we do not know what to
ask ; and when we do, then we find difficulty
to bring our will to desire it ; and when that is
instructed and kept in awe, it mingles interest,
and confounds the purposes ; and when it is

56 PRA YER.

forced to ask honestly and severely, then it
wills so coldly, that God hates the prayer ; and
if it desires fervently, it sometimes tm-ns that
into passion, and that passion breaks into mur-
murs or unquietness ; or if that be avoided, the
indifferency cools into death, or the fire bui'ns
violently and is quickly spent ; our desires are
duU as a rock, or fugitive as lightning : either
we ask ill things earnestly, or good things re-
missly ; we either court oiu' own danger, or are
not zealous for our real safety ; or if we be
right in our matter, or earnest in our affections,
and lasting in our abode, yet we miss in the
manner ; and either we ask for evil ends, or
without religious and awful apprehensions ; or
we rest in the words and signification of the
prayer, and never take care to pass on to ac-
tion ; or else we sacrifice in the company of
Corah, being partners of a schism, or a rebel-
lion in religion ; or we bring unhallowed cen-
sers, our hearts send up to God an unholy
smoke, a cloud fi-om the fires of lust, and either
the flames of lust or rage, of wine or revenge,
kindle the beast that is laid upon the altar ; or
we bring swine's flesh, or a dog's neck ; where-
as God never accepts, or delights in a prayer,
unless it be for a holy thing, to a lawful end,
presented unto him upon the wings of zeal and
love, of religious sorrow, or religious joy, by
sanctified lips, and piu'e hands, and a sincere

PRAYER. 57

heart. It must be the prayer of a graciotis
man ; and he is only gracious before God, and
acceptable, and effective in his prayer, whose
life is holy, and whose prayer is holy ; for both
these are necessary ingredients to the constitu-
tion of a prevailing prayer ; there is a hohness
peculiar to the man, and a holiness peculiar to
the prayer, that must adorn the prayer before
it can be united to the intercession of the holy
Jesus, in which union alone our prayers can be
prevailing.

Lust and uncleanness are a direct enemy to
the prapng man, an obstruction to his prayers ;
for this is not only a profanation, but a direct
sacrilege ; it defiles a temple to the ground ; it
takes fi'om a man all affection to spiritual
things, and mingles his very soul with the
thuigs of the world ; it makes his understand-
ing low, and his reasonings cheap and foohsh,
and it destroys his confidence, and all his man-
ly hopes ; it makes his spirit light, effeminate,
and fantastic, and dissolves his attention ; and
makes his mind so to disaffect all the objects of
his desires, that when he prays he is as uneasy
as an impaled person, or a condemned criminal
upon the hook or wheel : and it hath in it this
evU quality, that a lustfid person cannot pray
heartUy against his sin ; he cannot desire his
cure, for his will is contradictory to his collect,
and he would not that God should hear the

58 PBA YER.

words of liis prayer, wlr'ch he, poor man, never
intended. For no crime so seizes upon the will
as that ; some sins steal an aftection, or obey a
temptation, or secure an interest, or work by
the way of understanding, but lust seizes di-
rectly upon the will, for the devil knows Avell
that the lusts of the body, are soon cured ; the
uneasiness that dwells there is a disease very
tolerable, and every degree of patience can pass
under it. But therefore the devil seizes upon
the will, and that is it that makes advilteries and
all the species of uncleanness ; and lust grows
so hard a cure, because the formality of it is,
that it will not be cured ; the will loves it, and,
so long as it does, God cannot love the man ;
for God is the prince of purities, and the Son
of God is the kmg of virgms, and the Holy
Spuit is all love, and that is all purity, and all
spu-ituality : and therefore the prayer of an
adulterer, or an unclean person, is like the sac-
rifices to Moloch, or the rites of Flora, " ubi
Cato spectator esse non potuit.''^ A good man
will not endure them ; much less will God
entertain such reekings of the Dead Sea and
clouds of Sodom. For so an impure vapor,
begotten of the slime of the earth by the fevers
and adulterous heats of an intemperate summer-
sun, striving by the ladder of a mountain to
chmb up to heaven, and rolling into various
figures by an uneasy, unfixed revolution, and

PEA TER. 59

stopped at the middle region of the air, being
thrown fi'om his pride and attempt of jaassing
towards the seat of the stars, tiu'ns into an un-
wholesome flame, and, like the breath of hell, is
confined into a prison of darkness, and a cloud,
till it breaks into diseases, plagues, and niU-
dews, stink and blastings : so is the prayer of
an unchaste person ; it strives to chmb the bat-
tlements of heaven, but because it is a flame of
sulphur, salt, and bitumen, and was kindled m
the dishonorable regions below, derived from
hell, and contrary to God, it cannot pass forth
to the element of love, but ends in barrenness
and murmiu', fantastic expectations, and trifling
unaginative confidences ; and they at last end
in sorrows and despair. Every state of sin is
against the possibility of a man's being ac-
cepted ; but these have a proper venom against
the graciovisness of the person, and the power
of the prayer. God can never accept an lui-
holy prayer, and a wicked man can never send
forth any other ; the waters pass through im-
pure aqueducts and channels of brimstone, and
therefore may end in brimstone and fire, but
never in forgiveness and the blessings of an
etenial charity.

Henceforth, therefore, never any more w^on-
der that men pray so seldom ; there are few
that feel the relish, and are enticed with the
deliciousness, and refi-eshed with the comforts,

60 PR A YER.

and instmcted with the sanctity, and acquainted
with the secrets of a holy prayer : but cease
also to wonder, that of those few that say many
prayers, so few find any return of any at all.
To make up a good and a lawful prayer, there
must be charity, with all its daughters, alms,
forgiveness, not judging i uncharitably ; there
must be purity of spirit, that is, purity of inten-
tion ; and there must be purity of the body and
soul, that is, the cleanness of chastity ; and
there must be no vice remaining, no affection
to sin : for he that brings his body to God, and
hath left his will in the power of any sin, offers
to God the calves of his hps, but not a whole
burnt-offering ; a lame oblation, but not a " rea-
sonable sacrifice "; and therefore their portion
shall be amongst them whose prayers were
never recorded in the book of life, whose tears
God never put into his bottle, whose desires
shall remain ineffectual to eternal ages.

Plutarch reports, that the Tyrians tied their
gods with chains, because certain persons did
dream that Apollo said he would leave their
city and go to the party of Alexander, who
then besieged the town : and Apollodorus tells
of some, that tied the image of Saturn with
bands of wool upon his feet. So some Cliris-
tians ; they think God is tied to their sect, and
bound to be of their side, and the interest of
their opinion ; and they think, he can never go

PR A TER. 61

to the enemy's party, so long as they charm
hhn Avith certain forms of words or disguises of
their own ; and then all the success they have,
and all the evils that are prosperous, all the
mischiefs they do, and all the ambitious designs
that do succeed, they reckon upon the account
of their prayers ; and^well they may : for their
prayers are sins, and their desires are evil ;
they wish mischief, and they act iniquity, and
they enjoy their sin : and if this be a blessing
or a cursing, themselves shall then judge, and
all the world shall perceive, when the accounts
of all the world are truly stated ; then, when
prosperity shall be called to accounts, and ad-
versity shall receive its comforts, when virtue
shall have a crown, and the satisfaction of all
sinful desires shall be recompensed with an in-
tolerable sorrow, and the despau' of a perishing
soul. Nero's mother prayed passionately, that
her son might be emperor ; and many persons,
of whom St. James speaks, "pray to spend vipon
their lusts," and they are heard too : some
were not, and very many are : and some, that
fight against a just possessor of a country, pray,
that their wars may be prosperous ; and some-
times they have been heard too : and Julian
the Apostate prayed, and sacrificed, and in-
quired of demons, and burned man's flesh, and
operated with secret rites, and all that he
might craftily and powerfully oppose the relig-

62 PRAYER.

ion of Christ ; and he was heard too, and did
mischief beyond the maUce and the effect of
his predecessors, that did swim in Christian
blood. But when we sum up the accounts at
the foot of their hves, or so soon as the thing
was understood, we find that the effect of Ag-
grippina's prayer was, that her son murdered
her ; and of those lustful petitioners, in St.
James, that they were given over to the tyr-
anny and possession of their passions and
baser appetites ; and the effect of Julian the
Apostate's prayer was, that he lived and died
a professed enemy, of Christ ; and the effect of
the prayers of usurpers is, that they do mis-
chief, and reap curses, and undo mankind, and
provoke God, and live hated, and die miser-
able, and shall possess the fruit of their sin to
eternal ages.

The first thing that hinders the prayer of a
good man from obtaining its effects is a violent
anger, and a violent storm in the spirit of him
that prays. . For anger sets the house on fire,
and all the spirits are busy upon trouble, and
intend propulsion, defence, displeasure, or re-
venge ; it is a short madness, and an eternal
enemy to discourse, and sober counsels, and
fair conversation ; it intends its own object with
all the earnestness of perception, or activity
of design, and a quicker motion of a too warm
and distempered blood ; it is a fever in the

PRAYER. 63

heart, and a calenture in the head, and a fire
in the face, and a sword in the hand, and a
fury all over ; and therefore can never suffer a
man to be in a disposition to pray. For prayer
is an action, and a state of intercourse and
desire, exactly contrary to this character of
anger. Prayer is an action of likeness to the
Holy Ghost, the spirit of gentleness and dove-
like simplicity ; an imitation of the holy Jesus,
whose spirit is meek, up to the greatness of
the biggest example ; and a conformity to God,
whose anger is always just, and marches
slowly, and is without transportation, and often
hindered, and never hasty, and is full of mercy :
prayer is the peace of om* spirit, the stillness
of our thoughts, the evenness of recollection,
the seat of meditation, the rest of our cares,
and the calm of our tempest ; prayer is the
issue of a quiet mind, of untroubled thoughts ;
it is the daughter of charity, and the sister of
meekness ; and he that prays to God with an
angry, that is, with a troubled and discomposed
spirit, is like him that retires into a battle to
meditate, and sets up his closet in the out-
quarters of an army, and chooses a frontier-
garrison to be wise in. Anger is a perfect
ahenation of the mind from prayer, and there-
fore is contrary to that attention which pre-
sents our prayers in a right line to God. For
so have I seen a lark rising from his bed of

64 PRA TER.

grass, and soaring upwards, singing as he rises,
and hopes to get to heaven, and climb above
the clouds ; but the poor bird was beaten back
with the loud sia;hino;s of an eastern wind, and
his motion made irregular and inconstant, de-
scending more at every breath of the tempest
than it could recover by the libration and fre-
quent weighing of his wings ; till the little
creature was forced to sit down and pant, and
stay till the storm was over ; and then it made
a prosperous flight, and did rise and sing, as
if it had learned music and motion from an
angel, as he passed sometimes through the air
about his ministries here below. So is the
prayer of a good man ; when his affairs have
required business, and his business was matter
of discipline, and his discipline was to pass upon
a sinning person, or had a design of charity, his
duty met with the infirmities of a man, and
anger was its instrument, and the instrument
became stronger than the prime agent, and
raised a tempest, and overruled the man ; and
then his prayer was broken, and his thoughts
were troubled, and his words went up towards
a cloud, and his thoughts pulled them back
again and made them without intention ; and
the good man sighs for his infirmity, but must
be content to lose the prayer, and he must
recover it when his anger is removed, and his
spirit is becalmed, made even as the brow of

PRATER. 65

Jesus, and smooth like the heart of God ; and
then it ascends to heaven upon the wings of
the holy dove, and dwells with God, till it
returns, like the useful bee, laden with a bless-
ing and the dew of heaven.

But, then, for spiritual things, for the inter-
est of our souls, and the affairs of the king-
dom, we praj to God \dt\\ just such a zeal as
a man begs of a surgeon to cut him of the
stone, or a condemned man desires his execu-
tioner quickly to put him out of his pain, by
takuig away his life ; when thmgs are come to
that pass, it must be done, but God knows with
what little complacency and desire the man
makes his request. And yet the things of re-
ligion and the spuit are the only tilings that
ought to be desu-ed vehemently, and pursued
passionately, becaixse God hath set such a value
upon them, that they are the effects of his
greatest loving-kindness ; they are the pur-
chases of Christ's blood, and the effect of his
continual intercession ; the fruits of his bloody
sacrifice, and the gifts of his healing and saving
mercy; the graces of God's spirit, and the only
instruments of fehcity ; and if we can have
fondness for things indifferent or dangerous,
our prayers upbraid our spirits when we beg
coldly and tamely for those things for Avhich
we ought to die, which are more precious than
the globes of kmgs, and weightier than imperial

66 PBA YER.

sceptres, richer than the spoils of the sea, or
the treasures of the Indian hills.

He tliat is cold and tame in his prayers, hath
not tasted of the deliciousness of religion and
the goodness of God ; he is a stranger to the
secrets of the kingdom, and therefore he does
not know what it is either to have hunger or
satiety ; and therefore neither are they hungry
for God nor satisfied with the world, but re-
main stupid and inapprehensive, without resolu-
tion and determination, never choosing clearly,
nor pursuing earnestly ; and therefore never
enter into possession, but always stand at the
gate of weariness, unnecessary caution, and
perpetual irresolution. But so it is too often
in our prayers ; we come to God because it is
civil so to do and a general custom, but neither
drawn thither by love, nor pinched by spirit-
ual necessities, and pungent apprehensions :
we say so many prayers, because we are re-
solved so to do, and we pass tlirough them,
sometimes with a little attention, sometimes
with none at all ; and can we think that the
grace of chastity can be obtained at such a
pvurchase, that grace that hath cost more la-
bors than all the persecutions of faith, and all
the disputes of hope, and all the expense of
charity besides, amounts to ? Can we expect
that our sins should be washed by a lazy prayer ?

Though your person be as gracious as David

PR A YER. 67

or Job, and your desire as holy as the love of
angels, and your necessities great as a new-
penitent, yet it pierces not the clouds, unless
it be also as loud as thunder, passionate as the
cries of women, and clamorous as necessity.
For every prayer we make is considered by
God, and recorded in heaven ; but cold prayers
are not put into the account in order to effect
an acceptation, but are laid aside like the buds
of roses which a cold wind hath nipped into
death, and the discolored tawny face of an
Indian slave : and when, in order to your hopes
of obtaining a gi'eat blessing, you reckon up
your prayers with which you have solicited
your suit in the court of heaven, you must
reckon, not by the number of the collects, but
by your sighs and passions, by the vehemence
of your desires and the fervor of your spirit,
the apprehension of your need and the con-
sequent prosecution of your supply. Christ
prayed " with loud cryings," and St. Paul
made mention of his scholars in his prayers
" night and day." Fall upon yom* knees and
grow there, and let not your desires cool nor
your zeal remit, but renew it again and again ;
and let not your offices and the custom of pray-
ing put thee in mind of thy need, but let thy
need draw thee to thy holy offices ; and remem-
ber how great a God, how glorious a Majesty
you speak to ; therefore let not your devotions

'68 PSA YER.

and addresses be little. Remember how great
a need tliou hast ; let not your desires be less.
Remember how great the thing is you pray
for ; do not undervalue it with any indifFerency.
Remember that prayer is an act of religion ;
let it, therefore, be made thy business : and,
lastly, remember that God hates a cold prayer,
and, therefore, will never bless it, but it shall
be always ineffectual.

No prayers can prevail upon an indisposed
person. For the sun himself cannot enlighten
a blind eye, nor the soul move a body whose
silver cord is loosed, and whose joints are un-
tied by the rudeness and dissolutions of a per-
tinacious sickness. But then, suppose an eye
quick and healthfiil, or apt to be refreshed with
light and a friendly prospect ; yet a glow-worm
or a diamond, the shells of pearl, or a dead
man's candle, are not enough to make him dis-
cern the beauties of the world, and to admire
the glories of creation.

A man of an ordinary piety is like Gideon's
fleece, wet in its own locks, but it could not
water a poor man's garden. But so does a
thirsty land drink all the dew of heaven that
wets its face, and a greater shower makes no
torrent, nor digs so much as a little ftirrow,
that the drills of the water might pass into
rivers, or refr^esh their neighbor's weariness ;
but when the earth is frill, and hath no strange

PRAYER. 69

consumptive needs, then at the next time when
God blesses it with a gracious shower, it divides
into portions, and sends it abroad in free and
equal communications, that all that stand rovmd
about may feel the shower. So is a good
man's prayer ; his own cup is full, it is crowned
with health, and overflows with blessings, and
all that ch-ink of liis cup and eat at his table
are refreshed with his joys, and divide with him
in his holy portions.

The world itself is established and kept from
dissolution by the prayers of saints ; and the
prayers of saints shall hasten the day of judg-
ment; and we cannot easily find two effects
greater. But there are many other very great
ones ; for the prayers of holy men appease
God's wrath, drive away temptations, and resist
and overcome the devil : holy prayer procures
the ministry and service of angels, it rescinds
the decrees of God, it cures sicknesses and
obtains pardon, it arrests the sun in its course,
and stays the wheels of the chariot of the
moon ; it rules over all God's creatures, and
opens and shuts the storehouses of rain ; it
unlocks the cabinet of the womb, and quenches
the violence of fire ; it stops the mouths of
lions, and reconciles our sufferance and weak
faculties with the violence of torment and
sharpness of persecution ; it pleases God and
supplies all our needs.

70 PARDON OF SIN.

Prayer can obtain everything ; it can open
the windows of heaven, and shut the gates of
hell ; it can put a holy constraint upon God,
and detain an angel till he leave a blessino- : it
can open the treasures of rain, and soften the
iron ribs of rocks, till they melt into tears and
a flowing river ; prayer can unclasp the girdles
of the north, saying to a mountain of ice. Be
thou removed hence, and cast into the bottom
of the sea ; it can arrest the sun in the midst
of his course, and send the swift-winged winds
upon our errand ; and all those strange things,
and secret decrees, and unrevealed transactions,
which are above the clouds and far beyond the
regions of the stars, shall combine in ministry
and advantages for the praying man.

PARDON OF SIN.

TF we consider upon how trifling and incon-
-*- siderable grounds most men hope for pardon,
(if at least that may be called hope, which is
nothing but a careless boldness, and an imrea-
sonable wilful confidence,) we shall see much
cause to pity very many who are going merrily
to a sad and intolerable death. Pardon of sins
is a mercy which Christ purchased with his
dearest blood, which he ministers to us upon

PARDON OF SIN. 71

conditions of an infinite kindness, but yet of
great holiness and obedience, and an active
living faith. It is a grace, that the most holy-
persons beg of God with mighty passion, and
labor for with a great diligence, and expect
wath trembling fears, and concerning it many
times suffer sadnesses with uncertain souls, and
receive it by degrees, and it enters upon them
by Httle portions, and it is broken as their sighs
and sleeps. But so have I seen the returning
sea enter upon the strand ; and the waters roll-
ing towards the shore, throw up little portions
of the tide, and retire as if nature meant to
play, and not to change the abode of waters ;
but still the flood crept by little stoppings, and
invaded more by his progressions than he lost
by his retreat ; and having told the number of
its steps, it possesses its new portion tiU the
angel calls it back, that it may leave its un-
faithful dwelling of the sand. So is the pardon
of our sm ; it comes by slow motions, and first
quits a present death, and turns, it may be,
into a sharp sickness ; and if that sickness prove
not health to the soul, it washes off", and it may
be will dash against the rock again, and pro-
ceed to take off the several instances of anger
and the periods of wrath ; but all this while
it is uncertain concerning our final interest,
whether it be ebb or flood ; and every hearty
prayer and every bountiful alms still enlarges

72 GODLY FEAR.

the pardon, or adds a degree of probability and
hope ; and then a drunken meeting, or a covet-
ous desire, or an act of lust, or looser swear-
ing, idle talk, or neglect of religion, makes the
pardon retire ; and while it is disputed between
Christ and Christ's enemj, who shall be Lord,
the pardon fluctuates like the wave, striving to
climb the rock, and is washed off like its own
retinue, and it gets possession by time and un-
certainty, by difficulty and the degrees of a
hard progression.

GODLY FEAE.

T?EAR is the great bridle of intemperance,
-*- the modesty of the spirit, and the restramt
of gayeties and dissolutions ; it is the girdle to
the soul, and the handmaid to repentance, the
arrest of sin, and the cure or antidote to the
spirit of reprobation ; it preserves our apprehen-
sions of the divine majesty, and hinders our
single actions from combining to sinful habits ;
it is the mother of consideration, and the nurse
of sober comisels ; and it puts the soul to fer-
mentation and activity, making it to pass from
trembling to caution, from caution to careful-
ness, from carefulness to watchftilness, from
thence to prudence ; and by the gates and prog-
resses of repentance, it leads the soul on to

GODLY FEAR. 73

love, and to felicity, and to joys in God that
shall never cease again. Fear is the guard of
a man m the days of prosperity, and it stands
upon the watch-towers, and spies the approach-
ing danger, and gives warning to them that
laugh loud, and feast in the chambers of re-
joicing, where a man cannot consider by reason
of the noises of wme and jest and music : and
if prudence takes it by the hand, and leads it
on to duty, it is a state of grace, and a mii-
versal instrument to infant religion, and the
only security of the less perfect persons ; and
in all senses is that homao-e we owe to God,
who sends often to demand it, even then when
he speaks in thunder, or smites by a plague, or
awakens us by threatenmgs, or discomposes our
cashless by sad thoughts, and tender eyes, and
fearful hearts, and trembling considerations.

But this so excellent orace is soon abused m
the best and most tender spirits ; in those who
are softened by nature and by religion, by in-
fehcities or cares, by sudden accidents or a sad
soul ; and the devil, observing that fear, like spare
diet, starves the fevers of lust and quenches
the flames of hell, endeavors to heiohten this
abstinence so much as to starve the man, and
break the spirit into timorousness and scruple,
sadness and unreasonable tremblings, creduhty
and trifling observation, suspicion and false
accusations of God ; and then vice being turned

74 GODLY FEAR.

out at tlie gate, returns in at the postern, and
does the work of hell and death by running
too mconsiderately in the paths which seem to
lead to heaven. But so have I seen a harm-
less dove, made dark with an artificial night,
and her eyes sealed and locked up with a little
quill, soaring upward and flying with amaze-
ment, fear, and an undiscerning wing ; she
made towards heaven, but knew not that she
was made a train and an instrument to teach
her enemy to prevail upon her and all her de-
fenceless kindred. So is a superstitious man,
zealous and blind, forward and mistaken ; he
runs towards heaven, as he thinks, but he
chooses foolish paths, and out of fear takes any-
thing that he is told ; or fancies and guesses
concerning God by measures taken from his
own diseases and imperfections. But fear,
when it is inordinate, is never a good counsel-
lor, nor makes a good friend ; and he that fears
God as liis enemy, is the most completely mis-
erable person in the world. For if he with
reason beheves God to be his enemy, then the
man needs no other argument to prove that he
is undone than this, that the fountain of bless-
ing (in this state in which the man is) will
never issue anything upon him but cursings.
But if he fears this without reason, he makes
his fears true by the very suspicion of God,
doing him dishonor, and then doing those fond

GODLY FEAR. 75

and trifling acts of jealousy which will make
God to be what the man feared he ah-eady was.
We do not know God, if we can think any hard
thing concerning him. If God be merciiul, let
us only fear to offend him ; but then let us
never be fearfid that he will destroy us, when
w^e are careful not to displease him. There are
some persons so miserable and scrupulous, such
perpetual tormentors of themselves with unne-
cessary fears, that theu* meat and drink is a
snare to theu' consciences ; if they eat, they
fear they are gluttons ; if they fast, they fear
they are hypocrites ; and if they would watch,
they complain of sleep as of a deadly sin ; and
every temptation, though resisted, makes them
cry for pardon ; and every return of such an
accident makes them think God is angry ; and
every anger of God will break them in pieces.
These persons do not believe noble things
concerning God ; they do not think that he is
as ready to pardon them as they are to pardon
a sinning servant ; they do not believe how
much God dehghts m mercy, nor how wise he
is to consider and to make abatement for our
unavoidable infirmities ; they make judgment
of themselves by the measures of an angel,
and take the accomit of God by the proj^or-
tions of a tyi'ant. The best that can be said
concerning such persons is, that they are huge-
ly tempted, or hugely ignorant. For although

76 GODLY FEAR.

ignorance is by some persons named the mother
of devotion, yet, if it falls in a hard ground, it
is the mother of atheism ; if in a soft ground,
it is the parent of superstition ; but if it pro-
ceeds from evil or mean opinions of God, (as
such scruples and unreasonable fears do many
times,) it is an evil of a great impiety, and, in
some sense, if it were in equal degrees, is as
bad as atheism ; for so he that says there was
no such man as Julius Caesar does him less dis-
pleasure than he that says there was, but that
he was a tyrant and a bloody parricide. And
the Cimmerians were not esteemed impious for
saying that there was no sun in the heavens ;
but Anaxagoras was esteemed irreligious for
saying the sun was a very stone : and though
to deny there is a God is a high impiety and
intolerable, yet he says worse who, believing
there is a God, says he delights in human sacri-
fices, in miseries and death, in tormenting his
servants, and punishing their very infelicities
and unavoidable mischances. To be God, and
to be essentially and infinitely good, is the
same thing ; and therefore to deny either is
to be reckoned among the greatest crimes in
the world.

Let the grounds of our actions be noble,
beginning upon reason, proceeding with pru-
dence, measured by the common lines of men,
and confident upon the expectation of a usual

GODLY FEAR. 77

providence. Let us proceed from causes to
effects, from natural means to ordinaiy events,
and believe felicity not to be a chance but a
choice ; and evil to be the daughter of sin and
the divine anger, not of fortune and fancy. Let
us fear God when we have made him angry,
and not be afi'aid of him when we heartily and
laboriously do our duty. Oiu' fears are to be
measured by open revelation and certain expe-
rience, by the threatenings of God and the say-
ings of "svise men, and their hmit is reverence,
and godhness is their end ; and then fear shaU
be a duty, and a rare instrument of many. In
all other cases it is superstition or folly, it is
sin or punishment, the ivy of religion, and the
misery of an honest and a weak heart ; and is
to be cured only by reason and good company,
a wise guide and a plain rule, a cheei-ftd spirit
and a contented mind, by joy in God according
to the commandments, that is, " a rejoicing
evermore."

The illusions of a weak piety, or an unskilfal
confident soul, fancy to see mountains of diffi-
culty ; but touch them, and they seem hke
clouds ricUng upon the wings of the wind, and
put on shapes as we please to dream. He that
denies to give alms for fear of being poor, or to
entertain a disciple for fear of being suspected
of the party, or to own a duty for fear of being
put to venture for a crown ; he that takes part

78 HUMAN WEAKNESS.

of the intemperance because lie dares not dis-
please the company, or in any sense fears the
fears of the world and not the fear of God, —
tliis man enters into his portion of fear betimes,
but it will not be finished to eternal ages. To
fear the censures of men, when God is your
judge ; to fear their evil, when God is yoiu'
defence ; to fear death, when he is the entrance
to Hfe and felicity, is unreasonable and perni-
cious. But if you will tiu-n your passion into
duty and joy and security, fear to ofifend God,
to enter voluntarily into temptation ; fear the
alluring face of lust, and the smooth entertain-
ments of intemperance ; fear the anger of God,
when you have deserved it; and, when you
have recovered from the snare, then infinitely
fear to return into that condition, in which
whosoever dwells is the heir of fear and eter-
nal sorrow.

HUMAN WEAKNESS.

^PIERE is nothing that creeps upon the
-*- earth, nothing that ever God made, weaker
than man. For God fitted horses and mules
with strength, bees and pismires with sagacity,
harts and hares with swiftness, birds with
feathers and a light airy body ; and they all
know their times, and are fitted for their

FAITH. 79

work, and regularly acqiiire the proper end
of their creation. But man, that was de-
signed to an immortal duration, and the frui-
tion of God forever, knows not how to ob-
tam it ; he is made upright to look up to
heaven, but he knows no more how to pm*-
chase it than to chmb it. Once, man went
to make an ambitious tower to outreach the
clouds, or the preternatural risings of the
water, but could not do it ; he cannot prom-
ise himself the daily bread of his necessity
upon the stock of his own wit or industry ;
and for going to heaven, he was so far from
doing that naturally, that as soon as ever he
was made, he became the son of death, and he
knew not how to get a pardon for eating of
an apple against the divine commandment.

FAITH.

T7AITH is a certain image of eternity ; all
-^ things are present to it ; things past and
things to come are all so before the eyes of
faith, that he in whose eye that candle is en-
kindled beholds heaven as present, and sees
how blessed a thing it is to die in God's favor,
and to be chimed to our grave with the music
of a good conscience. Faith converses ^vith

80 FAITH.

the angels, and antedates the hymns of glory ;
every man that hath this grace is as certain
that there are glories for him, if he perseveres
in duty, as if he had heard and siing the thanks-
givmg-song for the blessed sentence of dooms-
day. And therefore it is no matter if these
things are separate and distant objects ; none
but childi'en and fools are taken with the pres-
ent trifle, and neglect a distant blessing of
which they have credible and believed notices.
Did the merchant see the pearls and the wealth
he designed to get in the trade of twenty
years ? And is it possible that a child should,
when he learns the first rudiments of grammar,
know what excellent things there are in learn-
ing, whither he designs his labor and liis hopes ?
We labor for that which is uncertain and dis-
tant and believed, and hoped for with many
allays, and seen mth diminution, and a troubled
ray ; and what excuse can there be that we do
not labor for that which is told us by God, and
preached by his only Son, and confirmed by
miracles, and which Christ himself died to pur-
chase, and millions of martyrs died to witness,
and which we see good men and wise believe
with an assent stronger than their evidence,
and which they do believe because they do
love, and love because they do believe ? There
is nothing to be said, but that faith which did
enlighten the bhnd, and cleanse the lepers, and

LUKEWABMNESS AND ZEAL. 81

•washed the soul of the Ethiopian ; that faith
that cures the sick, and strengthens the para-
lytic, and baptizes the catechumens, and justi-
fies the faithful, and repairs the penitent, and
confirms the just, and crowns the martyrs ;
that faith, if it be true and proper. Christian
and ahve, active and effective in us, is suffi-
cient to appease the storm of our passions, and
to instruct all our ignorances, and to " make us
wise mi to salvation."

LUKEWARMNESS AND ZEAL.

A S our duty must be whole, so it must be
•^■*- fervent ; for a languishing body may have
all its parts, and yet be useless to many pur-
poses of natiu'e : and you may reckon all the
joints of a dead man, but the heart is cold, and
the joints are stiff, and fit for nothmg but for
the little people that creep in graves. And so
are very many men ; if you sum up the ac-
counts of then' religion, they can reckon days
and months of religion, various offices, charity
and prayers, reading and meditation, faith and
knowledge, catecliism and sacraments, duty to
God and duty to princes, paying debts and pro-
vision for children, confessions and tears, disci-
pline in famihes, and love of good people ; and
6

82 LUKEWARMNESS AND ZEAL.

it may be, you shall not rej^rove their mimbers,
or find any lines mifilled in their tables of
accounts. But when you have handled all
tliis, and considered, you will find at last you
have taken a dead man by the hand ; there is
not a finger wanting, but they are stiff as
icicles, and without flexure, as the legs of
elephants.

I have seen a fair structure begun with art
and care, and raised to half its statui'e, and
then it stood still by the misfortune or negli-
gence of the owner ; and the rain descended,
and dwelt in its joints, and supplanted the con-
texture of its pillars ; and having stood a while
like the antiquated temple of a deceased ora-
cle, it fell into a hasty age, and sunk upon its
own knees, and so descended into ruin. So is
the imperfect, unfinished spirit of a man ; it
lays the foundation of a holy resolution, and
strengthens it with vows and arts of prosecu-
tion ; it raises up the walls, sacraments, and
prayers, reading, and holy ordinances ; and
holy actions begin with a slow motion, and the
buildhig stays, and the spirit is weary, and the
soul is naked, and exposed to temptations, and
in the days of storm takes in everythmg that
can do it mischief ; and it is faint and sick, list-
less and tu'ed, and it stands till its own weight
wearies the foundation, and then dechnes to
death and sad disorder.

LUKEWARMNESS AND ZEAL. 83

However it be very easy to have our thoughts
wander, yet it is oiu' indifFerency and lukewarm-
ness that makes it so natui'al : and you may ob-
serve it, that so long as the hght shines bright,
and the fires of devotion and desires flame out,
so lone the mind of a man stands close to the
altar, and waits upon the sacrifice ; but as the
fires die and desires decay, so the mind steals
away, and walks abroad to see the Httle images
of beauty and pleastu'e, which it beholds in the
falling stars and httle glow-worms of the world.
The river that runs slow and creeps by the
banks, and begs leave of every turf to let it
pass, is drawn into httle hollo\^^lesses, and
spends itself in smaller portions, and dies with
diversion ; but when it runs with vigorousness
and a full stream, and breaks down every ob-
stacle, making it even as its own brow, it stays
not to be tempted by httle avocations, and to
creep into holes, but rims into the sea through
full and useful channels. So is a man's prayer ;
if it moves upon the feet of an abated appetite,
it wanders into the society of every trifling
accident, and stays at the comers of the fancy,
and talks with every object it meets, and can-
not arrive at heaven ; but when it is carried
upon the wings of passion and strong desires, a
swift motion and a hungry appetite, it passes on
through all the intermedial regions of clouds,
and stays not till it dwells at the foot of the

84 LUKEWARMNESS AND ZEAL.

tlirone, where mei'cy sits, and thence sends
holy showers of refreshment. I deny not but
some httle drops will turn aside, and fall from
the full channel by the weakness of the banks,
and hollowness of the passage ; but the main
course is still continued : and although the most
earnest and devout persons feel and complain
of some looseness of spirit, and unfixed atten-
tions, yet their love and their desire secm*e the
main portions, and make the prayer to be
strong, fervent, and eflFectual.

He that is warm to-day and cold to-morrow,
zealous in his resolution and weary in his prac-
tices, fierce in the beginning and slack and
easy in his progress, hath not yet well chosen
what side he will be of; he sees not reason
enough for religion, and he hath not confidence
enough for its contrary ; and therefore he is, as
St. James calls him, "of a doubtftil mind."
For religion is worth as much to-day as it was
yesterday, and that cannot change though we
do ; and if we do, we have left God ; and
whither he can go that goes from God, his own
sorrows will soon enousrh instruct him. This
fire must never go out, but it must be like the
fire of heaven, it must shine like the stars ;
though sometimes covered with a cloud, or ob-
scured by a greater light, yet they dwell for-
ever in their orbs, and walk in their circles, and
observe their circumstances, but go not out by

LUKEWARMNESS AND ZEAL. 85

day nor niglit, and set not when kings die, nor
are extinguished when nations change their
government. So must the zeal of a Christian
be a constant mcentive of his duty ; and though
sometimes his hand is drawn back by violence
or need, and his prayers shortened by the im-
portunity of business, and some parts omitted
by necessities and just compliances, yet still the
fire is kept alive, it burns within when the light
breaks not forth, and is eternal as the orb of
fire, or the embers of the altar of incense.

In every action of religion God expects such
a warmth, and a holy fire to go along, that it
may be able to enkindle the wood upon the
altar, and consume the sacrifice ; but God hates
an indifferent spirit. Earnestness and vivacity,
quickness and delight, perfect choice of the
service and a dehght in the prosecution, is all
that the spirit of a man can yield towards his
rehcnon : the outward work is the effect of the
body ; but if a man does it heartily and with all
his mind, then religion hath wings and moves
upon wheels of fire.

The zeal of the Apostles was this : they
preached publicly and privately, they prayed
for all men, they wept to God for the hardness
of men's hearts, they " became all things to all
men, that they might gain some," they travel-
led through deeps and deserts, they endured
the heat of the Syrian star and the violence of

86 LUKEWARMNESS AND ZEAL.

Euroclydon, winds and tempests, seas and pris-
ons, mockings and sconrgings, fastings and
poverty, labor and watching ; they endured
every man and wronged no man ; they would
do any good thing and suffer any evil, if they
had but hopes to prevail upon a soul ; they
persuaded men meekly, they entreated them
humbly, they convinced them powerfully ; they
watched for their good, but meddled not with
their interest: and this is the Christian zeal,
the zeal of meekness, the zeal of charity, the
zeal of patience.

The Jews tell that Adam, having seen the
beauties and tasted the delicacies of paradise,
repented and mourned upon the Indian moun-
tains for three hundred years together : and we,
who have a great share in the cause of his sor-
rows, can by nothing be invited to a persever-
ing, a great, a passionate religion, more than
by remembering what he lost, and what is laid
up for them whose hearts are burning lamps,
and are all on fire with divine love, whose
flames are fanned with the wings of the holy
dove, and whose spirits shine and burn with
that fire which the holy Jesus came to en-
kindle upon the earth.

THE EPICURE'S FEAST. 87

THE EPICUEE'S FEAST.

T ET us eat and drink ; for to-morrow we
^ die." This is the epicure's proverb, begun
upon a weak mistake, started by chance from
the discourses of drink, and thought witty by
the undiscernmg company, and prevailed in-
finitely, because it struck their fancy luckily,
and mamtained the merry-meeting ; but, as it
happens commonly to such discourses, so this
also, when it comes to be examined by the con-
sultations of the morning, and the sober hours
of the day, it seems the most TN^tless and the
most unreasonable in the world. "When Seneca
describes the spare diet of Epicm-us and Me-
trodorus, he uses this expression : " Liberaliora
sunt ahmenta carceris ; sepositos ad capitale
supplicium, non tam anguste, qui occisurus est,
pascit," — The prison keeps a better table ; and
lie that is to kill the criminal to-morrow morn-
ing gives him a better supper over night. By
this he intended to represent his meal to be
very short ; for as dying persons have but little
stomach to feast high, so they that mean to cut
their throat will think it a vain expense to please
it with delicacies, which after the first altera-
tion must be poured upon the gi'ound, and
looked upon as the worst part of the accursed
tiling. And there is also the same proportion

88 THE EPICURE-' S FEAST.

of unreasonableness, that, because men shall die
to-morrow, and by the sentence and unalter-
able decree of God they are now descending to
their graves, that therefore they should first
destroy their reason, and then force dull time
to run faster, that they may die sottish as
beasts, and speedily as a fly. But they thought
there was no life after this ; or if there were,
it was without pleasure, and every soul thrust
into a hole, and a dormitory of a span's length
allowed for his rest, and for his walk ; and in
the shades below no numbering of healths by
the numeral letters of Philenium's name, no fat
mullets, no oysters of Lucrinus, no Lesbian or
Chian wines. Therefore now enjoy the deli-
cacies of nature, and feel the descending wines
distilled through the limbeck of thy tongue and
larynx, and suck the dehcious juice of fishes,
the marrow of the laborious ox, and the tender
lard of Apulian swine, and the condited bellies
of the scarus ; but lose no time, for the sun
drives hard, and the shadow is long, and the
days of mourning are at hand, but the number
of the days of darkness and the grave cannot
be told.

Thus they thought they discoursed wisely,
and their wisdom was turned into folly ; for all
their arts of providence, and witty securities
of pleasure, were nothing but unmanly pro-
logues to death, fear and folly, sensuality and

THE EPICURE'S FEAST. 89

beastly pleasures. But they are to be excused
rather than we. They placed themselves in
the order of beasts and birds, and esteemed
their bodies nothing but receptacles of flesh
and wine, larders and pantries ; and their soul
the fine instrument of pleasure and brisk re-
ception, of relishes and gusts, reflections and
duplications of delight ; and therefore they
treated themselves accordingly. But then why
we should do the same things, who are led by
other principles, and a more severe institution,
and better notices of immortality, who under-
stand what shall happen to a soul hereafter,
and know that this time is but a passage to
eternity, this body but a servant to the soul,
this soul a minister to the spirit, and the whole
man in order to God and to felicity; this, I
say, is more unreasonable than to eat aconite
to preserve our health, and to enter into the
flood that we may die a dry death ; this is a
perfect contradiction to the state of good
things, whither we are designed, and to all
the principles of a wise philosophy, whereby
we are instructed that we may become wise
unto salvation.

Plenty and the pleasures of the world ai'e
no proper instruments of fehcity. It is neces-
sary that a man have some violence done to
himself before he can receive them : for na-
ture's bounds are, " non esurire, non sitire, non

90 THE EPICURE'S FEAST.

algere^'' to be quit from hunger and thirst and
cold, — that is, to have nothing upon us that
puts us to pain ; against which she hath made
provisions by the fleece of the sheep and the
skins of the beasts, by the waters of the foun-
tain and the herbs of the field ; and of these
no good man is destitute, for that share that he
can need to fill those appetites and necessities
he cannot otherwise avoid. For it is unimao-in-
able that nature should be a mother, natural
and indulgent to the beasts of the forest, and
the spawn of fishes, to every plant and fungus,
to cats and owls, to moles and bats, making
her storehouses always to stand open to them ;
and that, for the Lord of all these, even to the
noblest of her productions, she should have
made no provisions, and only produced in us
appetites sharp as the stomach of wolves, troub-
lesome as the tiger's hunger, and then run
away, leaving art and chance, violence and
study, to feed us and to clothe us. This is so
far firom truth, that we are certainly more pro-
vided for by nature than all the world besides ;
for everything can minister to us ; and we can
pass into none of nature's cabinets, but we can
find our table spread : so that what David said
to God, " Whither shall I go from thy pres-
ence ? If I go to heaven, thou art there ; if I
descend to the deep, thou art there also ; if I
take the wings of the morning, and flee into

THE EPICURE'S FEAST. 91

the uttermost parts of the wilderness, even
there thou wilt find me out, and thy right
hand shall uphold me," we may say it concern-
ing our table and our wardrobe. If we go
into the fields, we find them tilled by the mer-
cies of heaven, and watered with showers from
God, to feed us, and to clothe us. If we go
down into the deep, there God hath multiplied
our stores, and filled a magazine which no
hunger can exhaust. The air drops down deh-
cacies, and the wilderness can sustain us ; and
all that is in nature, that which feeds lions, and
that which the ox eats, that which the fishes
live upon, and that which is the provision for
the birds, all that can keep us alive. And if we
consider that of the beasts and birds, for whom
nature hath provided but one dish, it may be
flesh or fish, or herbs or flies, and these also we
secure with guards from them, and drive away
birds and beasts from that provision which na-
ture made for them, yet seldom can we find
that any of these perish with hunger ; much
rather shall we find that we are secured bv the
securities proper for the more noble creatures
by that Providence that disposes all things ; by
that mercy that gives us all things which to
other creatures are ministered singly ; by that
labor that can procure what we need ; by that
wisdom that can consider concerning future
necessities ; by that power that can force it

92 THE EPICURE'S FEAST.

from inferior creatures ; and by that temper-
ance which can fit our meat to our necessities.
For if we go be3^ond what is needful, as we
find sometimes more than was promised, and
very often more than we need, so we disorder
the certainty of our fehcity, by putting that to
hazard which nature hath secured. For it is
not certain, that, if we desire to have the
wealth of Susa, or garments stained with the
blood of the Tyrian fish, that, if we desire to
feed like Philoxenus, or to have tables laden
like the boards of Vitellius, that we shall never
want. It is not natvire that desires these
things, but lust and violence ; and by a disease
we entered into the passion and the necessity,
and in that state of trouble it is likely we may
dwell forever, unless we reduce our appetites
to nature's measures. And therefore it is that
plenty and pleasures are not the proper instru-
ments of felicity. Because felicity is not a
jewel that can be locked in one man's cabinet.
God intended that all men should be made
happy ; and he that gave to all men the same
natural desires, and to all men provision of
satisfactions by the same meats and drinks,
intended that it sliould not go beyond that
measure of good things, which corresponds to
those desires which all men naturally have.

He that cannot be satisfied with common
provision, hath a bigger need than he that

THE EPICURE'S FEAST. 93

can ; it is harder, and more contingent, and
more difficult, and more troublesome for him
to be satisfied, "I feed sweetly," said Epicu-
rus, " upon bread and water, those sweet and
easy provisions of the body, and I defy the
pleasures of costly provisions " ; and the man
was so confident that he had the advantage
over wealthy tables, that he thought himself
happy as the immortal gods. For these pro-
visions are easy, they are to be gotten without
amazing cares ; no man needs to flatter if he
can live as nature did intend : " Magna pars
libertatis est bene moratus venter " ; he need
not swell his accounts, and intricate his spirit
with arts of subtilty and contrivance ; he can
be free from fears, and the chances of the
world cannot concern him. And this is true,
not only -in those severe and anchoretical and
philosophical persons, who hved meanly as a
sheep, and without variety as the Baptist, but
in the same proportion it is also true in every
man that can be contented with that which is
honestly sufficient. Maximus Tyrius considers
concerning the felicity of Diogenes, a poor
Sinopean, having not so much nobility as to
be bom in the better parts of Greece : but he
saw that he was compelled by no tyrant to
speak or do ignobly ; he had no fields to tUl,
and therefore took no care to buy cattle, and
to hire servants ; he was not distracted when a

94 THE EPICURE'S FEAST.

rent-day came, and feared not when tlie wise
Greeks played the fool and fought who should
be lord of that field that lay between Thebes
and Athens ; he laughed to see men scramble
for dirty silver, and spend ten thousand Attic
talents for the gettinor the revenues of two
hmidred phihppics ; he went with his staff and
bag into the camp of the Phocenses, and the
soldiers reverenced his person and despised his
poverty, and it was truce with him whosoever
had wars ; and the chadem of kings and the
piu'ple of the emperors, the mitre of high-
priests and the divining-staff of soothsayers,
were things of envy and ambition, the piu'-
chase of danger, and the rewards of a mighty
passion ; and men entered into them by trouble
and extreme difficulty, and dwelt under them
as a man under a falling roof, or as Damocles
under the tyrant's sword, sleeping like a con-
demned man ; and let there be what pleasure
men can dream of in such broken slumbers,
yet the fear of waking from this illusion, and
parting from this fantastic pleasure, is a pain
and torment which the imaginary felicity can-
not pay for.

All our trouble is from within us ; and if a
dish of lettuce and a clear fountain can cool all
my heats, so that I shall have neither thirst
nor pride, lust nor revenge, envy nor ambition,
I am lodged in the bosom of fehcity ; and, in-

THE EPICURE'S FEAST. 95

deed, no men sleep so soundly as they that lay
then* head upon nature's lap. For a smgle
dish, and a clean chahce lifted from the springs,
can ciu'e my hunger and thirst ; but the meat
of Ahasuerus's feast cannot satisfy my ambition
and my pride. He, therefore, that hath the
fewest desires and the most quiet passions,
whose wants are soon provided for, and whose
possessions cannot be disturbed with violent
fears, he that dwells next door to satisfaction,
and can carry his needs and lay them down
where he pleases, — this man is the happy
man ; and this is not to be done m great de-
signs and swelling fortunes. For as it is in
plants which nature thrusts forth fi-om her
navel, she makes regular provisions, and dresses
them with strength and ornament, with easiness
and frill stature ; but if you thrust a jessamine
there where she would have had a daisy grow,
or bring the tall fir from dwelling in his own
country, and transport the orange- or the al-
mond-tree near the fringes of the north star,
nature is displeased, and becomes unnatural,
and starves her sucklings, and renders you a
return less than your charge and expectation.
So it is in all our appetites ; when they are
natural and proper, nature feeds them and
makes them healthful and lusty, as the coarse
issue of the Scythian clown ; she feeds them
and makes them easy without cares and costly

96 THE EPICURE'S FEAST.

passions. But if you thrust an appetite into
her wliich she intended not, she gives you
sickly and uneasy banquets, you must struggle
with her for every drop of milk she gives be-
yond her own needs ; you may get gold from
her entrails, and at a great charge provide or-
naments for your queens and princely women :
but your hves are spent in the purchase ; and
when you have got them you must have more ;
for these cannot content you, nor nourish the
spirit. A man must labor infinitely to get
more than he needs ; but to di'ive away tliirst
and hunger, a man needs not sit in the fields
of the oppressed poor, nor lead armies, nor
break his sleep, nor suffer shame and danger,
and envy and affront, and aU the retinue of
infehcity.

If men did but know what felicity dwells in
the cottage of the poor man, how sound his
sleep, how quiet his breast, how composed his
mind, how free from care, how easy his pro-
vision, how healthful his morning, how §ober
his night, how moist his mouth, how joyful his
heart, they would never admu-e the noises and
the diseases, the throng of passions and the
violence of unnatural appetites, that fill the
houses of the luxuiious and the heart of the
ambitious. These which you call pleasiures are
but the imagery and fantastic appearances, and
such appearances even poor men may have.

THE EPICURE'S FEAST. 97

It is like felicity, that tlie king of Persia sliould
come to Babylon in the winter, and to Susa in
the summer ; and be attended with all the ser-
vants of one hiuidi'ed and twenty-seven prov-
inces, and ■\\^th all the prmces of Asia. It is like
this, that Diogenes went to Corinth in the time
of vintage, and to Athens when winter came ;
and instead of courts, visited the temples and
the schools, and was pleased in the society of
scholars and learned men, and conversed with
the students of all Asia and Europe. If a man
loves privacy, the poor fortune can have that
when princes cannot ; if he loves noises, he can
go to markets and to courts, and may glut
liimself with strange faces and strange voices
and strange manners, and the wild design of
all the world. And when that day comes
in which we shall die, nothing of the eating
and drinking remains, nothing of the pomp and
luxmy, but the son'ow to part with it, and
shame to have dwelt there where wisdom and
virtue seldom come, unless it be to call men to
sober counsels, to a plain and a severe and
more natural way of living ; and when Lucian
derides the dead princes and generals, and says
that in hell they go up and down selhng salt
meats and crpng mussels, or begging ; and he
brings in Philip of Macedon, mending of shoes
in a little stall ; he intended to represent, that in

the shades below, and in the state of the grave,

7

98 INTEMPERANCE.

the princes and voluptuous have a being differ-
ent from their present plenty ; but that their
condition is made contemptible and miserable
by its disproportion to their lost and perishing
voluptuousness. The result is this, that Tiresias
told the ghost of Menippus, inquiring what
state of life was nearest to fehcity, the private
life, that which is free from tumult and vanity,
noise and luxury, business and ambition, near-
est to nature, and a just entertainment to
om' necessities ; that life is nearest to felicity.
Therefore despise the swellings and the dis-
eases of a disordered life, and a proud vanity ;
be troubled for no outward thing beyond its
merit, enjoy the present temperately, and you
cannot choose but be pleased to see that you
have so Kttle share in the follies and miseries
of the intemperate world.

INTEMPEEANCE.

TNTEMPERANCE m eating and drinking is
■*- an enemy to health ; which is, as one calls
it, " ansa voluptatum et condimentum vitoe " ;
it is that handle by which we can apprehend
and perceive pleasures, and that sauce that
only makes hfe delicate ; for what content can
a frill table administer to a man in a fever ?

INTEMPERANCE. 99

Health is the opportunity of wisdom, the fair-
est scene of religion, the advantages of the
glorifications of God, the charitable ministries
to men ; it is a state of joy and thanksgiving,
and m every of its periods feels a pleasure from
the blessed emanations of a merciful Provi-
dence. The world does not minister, does
not feel, a greater pleasure, than to be newly
delivered from the racks or the gratings of the
stone, and the torments and convulsions of a
sharp colic ; and no organs, no harp, no lute,
can sound out the praises of the Almighty
Father so sprightfully, as the man that rises
from his bed of sorrows, and considers what an
excellent difference he feels from the groans
and intolerable accents of yesterday.

When Cyms had espied Astyages and his
fellows coming dnink from a banquet, laden
with varietv of folhes and filthiness, their legs
failing them, their eyes red and staring, coz-
ened with a moist cloud, and abused by a
doubled object, their tongues full of sponges,
and their heads no wiser, he thought they
were poisoned : and he had reason ; for what
malignant quality can be more venomous and
hurtful to a man than the effect of an Intem-
perate goblet and a frill stomach? It poisons
both the soul and body. All poisons do not
kill presently, and this wIU in process of time,
and hath formidable effects at present.

100 INTEMPERANCE.

But, therefore, metliinks tlie temptations
which men meet withal from without, are
in themselves most unreasonable and soon-
est confuted by us. He that tempts me to
drmk beyond my measure, civilly invites me
to a fever, and to lay aside my reason as
the Persian women did their garments and
their modesty at the end of feasts ; and all
the question then will be, which is the worst
evil, to refuse your uncivil kindness, or to
suffer a violent headache, or to lay up heaps
big enough for an Enghsh surfeit. Creon
in the tragedy said well, "It is better for
me to grieve thee, O stranger, or to be af-
ronted by thee, than to be tormented by thy
kindness the next day and the morrow after."

It is reported concerning Socrates, that
when Athens was destroyed by the plague,
he in the midst of all the danger escaped
untouched by sickness, because by a spare
and severe diet he had within him no tu-
mult of disorderly humors, no factions in his
blood, no loads of moisture prepared for char-
nel-houses or the sickly hospitals ; but a vig-
orous heat, and a well-proportioned radical
moisture ; he had enough for health and study,
philosophy and religion, for the temples and
the academy, but no superfluities to be spent
in groans and sickly nights. Strange it is that
for the stomach, which is scarce a span long,

INTEMPERANCE. 101

there should be provided so many furnaces and
ovens, huge fires and an army of cooks, cellars
swimmmg with wine, and granaries sweating
with com ; and that mto one belly should
enter the vintage of many nations, the spoils
of distant provinces, and the shell-fishes of sev-
eral seas. When the heathens feasted their
gods, they gave nothing but a fat ox, a ram,
or a kid ; they poured a little wine upon the
altar, and burned a handful of mim : but when
they feasted themselves, they had many vessels
filled with Campanian wine, turtles of Liguria,
Sicilian beeves, and wheat ft'om Eg}^t, wild
boars from Illyi-ium, and Grecian sheep ; vari-
ety, and load, and cost, and curiosity : and so
do we. It is so Httle we spend in religion, and
so very much upon ourselves, so httle to the
poor, and so without measure to make our-
selves sick, that we seem to be in love with
our own mischief, and so passionate for neces-
sity and want, that we strive all the ways we
can to make ourselves need more than nature
intended. I end this consideration with the
saying of the cynic : " It is to be wondered at,
that men eat so much for pleasirre sake ; and
yet for the same pleasure should not give over
eating, and betake themselves to the delights
of temperance, since to be healthful and holy
is so great a pleasm^e." However, certain it is
that no man ever repented that he arose from

102 INTEMPERANCE.

the table sober, healthful, and with his wits
about lum ; but very many have repented that
they sat so long, till their belhes swelled, and
their health, and their virtue, and their God is
departed from them.

Intemperance is the nurse of vice. It
makes rage and choler, pride and fantastic
principles ; it makes the body a sea of hu-
mors, and those humors the seat of violence.
By faring deliciously every day, men become
senseless of the evils of mankind, inapprehen-
sive of the troubles of their brethren, uncon-
cerned in the changes of the world, and the
cries of the poor, the hunger of the father-
less, and the thirst of widows. Tyi-ants, said
Diogenes, never come from the cottages of
them that eat pulse and coarse fare, but from
the delicious beds and banquets of the effemi-
nate and rich feeders. For, to maintain plenty
and luxury, sometimes wars are necessary, and
oppressions and violence : but no landlord did
ever grind the face of his tenants, no prince
ever sucked blood from his subjects, for the
maintenance of a sober and a moderate propor-
tion of good things.

Intemperance is a perfect destruction of wis-
dom. A full-gorged belly never produced a
sprightly mind : and therefore these kind of
men are called " slow bellies " ; so St. F'aul con-
cerning the intemperate Cretans, out of their

INTEMPERANCE. 103

own poet. They are like the tigers of Brazil,
which when they are empty are bold and swift
and ftdl of sagacity, but being full, sneak away
from the barking of a village dog. So are these
men, wise in the morning, quick and fit for
business ; but when the sun gives the sign to
spread the tables, and intemperance brings in
the messes, and dnmkenness fills the bowls,
then the man falls away and leaves a beast in
liis room. A full meal is hke Sisera's banquet,
at the end of Avhich there is a nail struck mto a
man's head ; it knocks a man down, and nails
his soul to the sensual mixtures of the body.
For what wisdom can be expected from them
whose soul dwells in clouds of meat, and floats
up and down in wme, like the spilled cups
which fell from their hands when they could
lift them to their heads no longer ? It is a per-
fect shipwreck of a man ; the pilot is drunk,
and the helm dashed in pieces, and the ship
first reels, and by swallowing too much is itself
swallowed up at last. And therefore the mad-
ness of the young fellows of Agrigentum, who,
being drunk, fancied themselves in a storm, and
the house the ship, was more than the wild
fancy of their cups ; it was really so, they were
all cast away, they were broken in pieces by
the foul disorder of the storm. The senses lan-
guish, the spark of divinity that dwells within
is quenched ; and the mind snorts, dead with

104 INTEMPERANCE.

sleep and fulness in the fouler regions of the
belly.

So have I seen the eye of the world looking
upon a fenny bottom, and di'uiking up too free
draughts of moisture, gathered them into a
cloud, and that cloud crept about his face, and
made him first look red, and then covered him
with darkness and an artificial night : so is our
reason at a feast. The clouds gather about the
head ; and according to the method and period
of the children, and productions of darkness, it
first grows red, and that redness tm-ns into an
obscurity and a thick mist, and reason is lost
to all use and profitableness of wise and sober
discourses. A cloud of folly and distraction
darkens the soul, and makes it crass and mate-
rial, polluted and heavy, clogged and laden like
the body; and there cannot be anything said
worse : reason turns into folly, wine and flesh
into a knot of clouds, the soul itself into a body,
and the spirit into corrupted meat. There is
nothing left but the rewards and portions of a
fool, to be reaped and enjoyed there, where
flesh and corruption shall dwell to eternal ages ;
their heads are gross, their souls are emerged
in matter, and drowaied in the moistures of an
unwholesome cloud ; they are dull of hearing,
slow in apprehension, and to action they are as
unable as the hands of a child who too hastily
hath broken the enclosures of his first dwelling.

INTEMPERANCE. 105

And now, after all this, I pray consider what
a strange madness and prodigious folly possess
many men, that they love to swallow death and
diseases and dishonor, with an appetite wdiich
no reason can restrain. We expect our ser-
vants should not dare to touch what we have
forbidden to them ; we are watchful that our
cliildren should not swallow poisons and filthi-
ness and unwholesome nourishment ; we take
care that they should be well-mannered and
ci\al and of fair demeanor ; and we ourselves
desh-e to be, or at least to be accounted, wise,
and would mfinitely scorn to be called fools ;
and we are so great lovers of health that we
will buy it at any rate of money or observance :
and then for honor ; it is that which the chil-
dren of men pursue with passion, it is one of the
noblest rewards of virtue, and the proper orna-
ment of the wise and valiant ; and yet all these
thino-s are not valued or considered when a
merry meeting, or a looser feast, calls upon the
man to act a scene of folly and madness, and
healthlessness and dishonor. We do to God
what we severely punish in our servants ; we
correct our children for their meddling with
dangers which themselves prefer before immor-
tality ; and though no man thinks himself fit to
be despised, yet he is willing to make himself
a beast, a sot, and a ridiculous monkey, with
the follies and vapors of wine ; and when he is

106 INTEMPERANCE.

high in drink or fancy, proud as a Grecian ora-
tor in the midst of his popular noises, at the
same time he shall talk such dirty language,
such mean low things, as may well become a
changeling and a fool, for whom the stocks are
prepared by the laws, and the just scorn of
men.

Every drunkard clothes his head M'ith a
mighty scorn, and makes himself lower at that
time than the meanest of his servants. The
boys can laugh at him when he is led like a
cripple, directed like a blind man, and speaks,
like an infant, imperfect noises, lisping with a
full and spongy tong-ue, and an empty head, and
a vain and foolish heart. So cheaply does he
part with his honor for drink or loads of meat ;
for which honor he is ready to die, rather than
hear it to be disparaged by another ; when him-
self destroys it, as bubbles jDerish with the breath
of children. Do not the laws of all wise na-
tions mark the drunkard for a fool, with the
meanest and most scornful punishment ? And
is there anything in the world so foohsh as a
man that is drunk ? But, good God ! what an
intolerable sorrow hath seized upon great por-
tions of mankind, that this folly and madness
shoiild possess the greatest spirits and the wit-
tiest men, the best company, the most sensible
of the word honor, and the most jealous of
losing the shadow, and the most careless of the

MARRIAGE. 107

thino- ? Is it not a horrid thing, that a wise or
a crafty, a learned or a noble person, should
dishonor himself as a fool, destroy his body as a
murderer, lessen his estate as a prodigal, dis-
grace every good cause that he can pretend to
by his relation, and become an appellative of
scorn, a scene of laughter or derision, and all
for the reward of forgetfulness and madness ?
for there are in immoderate drmking no other
pleasures.

I end with the saying of a wise man : He is
fit to sit at the table of the Lord, and to feast
with saints, who moderately uses the creatures
which God hath given him: but he that de-
spises even lawful pleasures, shall not only sit
and feast with God, but reign together with
him, and partake of his glorious kingdom.

IVIARRIAGE.

THE first blessing God gave to man was
society ; and that society was a marriage,
and that marriage was confederate by God
himself, and hallowed by a blessing: and at
the same time, and for very many descending
ages, not only by the instinct of nature, but by
a superadded forwardness, (God himself inspir-
ing the desire,) the world was most desirous of

108 MARRIAGE.

children, impatient of barrenness, accounting
single life a curse, and a childless person hated
by God. The world was rich and empty, and
able to provide for a more numerous posterity
than it had. When a family could drive their
herds, and set their children upon camels, and
lead them till they saw a fat soil watered with
rivers, and there sit down without paying rent,
they thought of nothing but to have great fam-
ilies, that their own relations might swell up
to a patriarchate, and their children be enough
to possess all the regions that they saw, and
their grandchildren become princes, and them-
selves build cities and call them by the name
of a child, and become the fountain of a
nation.

This was the consequent of the first bless-
ing, " Increase and multiply." The next
blessing was the promise of the Messiah ; and
that also increased in men and women a won-
derful desire of marriage : for as soon as God
had chosen the family of Abraham to be the
blessed line from whence the world's Re-
deemer should descend according to the flesh,
every of his daughters hoped to have the
honor to be his mother, or his grandmother,
or something of his kindred ; and to be child-
less in Israel was a sorrow to the Hebrew
women, great as the slavery of Egypt, or their
dishonors in the land of their captivity.

MARRIAGE. 109

But when the Messiah was come, and the
doctrine was puLHshed, and his ministers but
few, and his disciples were to suffer persecu-
tion, and to be of an unsettled dwelling, and
the nation of the Jews, in the bosom and so-
ciety of which the Church especially did dwell,
were to be scattered and broken all in pieces
with fierce calamities, and the world was apt to
calumniate and to suspect and dishonor Chris-
tians upon pretences and unreasonable jeal-
ousies, and that to all these purposes the state
of marriage brought many inconveniences ; it
pleased God in this new creation to inspire into
the hearts of his servants a disposition and
strong desire to lead a single life, lest the state
of marriage should in that conjunction of things
become an accidental impediment to the dis-
semination of the gospel, which called men
from a confinement in their domestic charo;es
to travel, and flight, and poverty, and difii-
culty, and martyrdom. Upon this necessity
the Apostles and apostolical men published
doctrines, declaring the advantages of single
life, not by any commandment of the Lord,
but by the spirit of prudence, for the present
and then incumbent necessities, and in order to
the advantages which did accrue to the public
ministries and private piety.

Upon this occasion it grew necessary for the
Apostle to state the question right, and to do

110 MARRIAGE.

honor to the holy rite of marriage, and to
snatch the mystery fi'om the hands of zeal
and folly, and to place it in Christ's right hand,
that all its beauties might appear, and a pres-
ent convenience might not bring in a false
doctrine, and a perpetual sin, and an intoler-
able mischief.

Marriage is a school and exercise of virtue ;
and though marriage hath cares, yet the single
life hath desires, which are more troublesome
and more dangerous, and often end in sin,
while the cares are but instances of duty and
exercises of piety ; and therefore, if single life
hath more privacy of devotion, yet marriage
hath more necessities and more variety of it,
and is an exercise of more graces. Here is the
proper scene of piety and patience, of the duty
of parents and the charity of relatives ; here
kindness is spread abroad, and love is united
and made firm as a centre. Marriage is the
nursery of heaven ; the virgin sends prayers
to God, but she carries but one soul to him ;
but the state of marriage fills up the numbers
of the elect, and hath in it the labor of love
and the delicacies of friendship, the blessing of
society and the union of hands and hearts ; it
hath in it less of beauty, but more of safety,
than the single life ; it hath more care, but less
danger ; it is more merry, and more sad ; is
fuller of sorrows, and fuller of joys; it lies

MARRIAGE. Ill

under more burdens, but is supported by all
the strengths of love and charity, and those
burdens are delightful.

Marriage is the mother of the world, and pre-
serves kingdoms, and fills cities and churches,
and heaven itself. Celibate, like the fly in the
heart of an apple, dwells in a perpetual sweet-
ness, but sits alone, and is confined and dies in
singularity ; but marriage, like the useful bee,
builds a house, and gathers sweetness from
every flower, and labors and unites into socie-
ties and republics, and sends out colonies, and
feeds the world with delicacies, and obeys their
king, and keeps order, and exercises many vir-
tues, and promotes the interest of mankind,
and is that state of good things to which God
hath designed the present constitution of the
world.

They that enter into the state of marriage,
cast a die of the greatest contingency, and yet
of the greatest interest in the world, next to
the last throw for eternity. Life or death,
felicity or a lasting sorrow, are in the power
of marriage. A woman indeed ventures most,
for she hath no sanctuary to retire to from an
evil husband; she must dwell upon her sorrow,
and hatch the eggs which her own folly or in-
felicity hath produced ; and she is more under
it, because her tormentor hath a warrant of
prerogative ; and the woman may complain to

112 MARRIAGE.

God as subjects do of tyrant princes, but other-
wise she hath no appeal in the causes of un-
kindness. And though tlie man can run from
many hours of his sadness, yet he must return
to it again ; and when he sits among his neigh-
bors, he remembers the objection that hes in
his bosom, and he sighs deeply. The boys,
and the pedlers, and the fruiterers, shall tell of
this man, when he is carried to his grave, that
he lived and died a poor wretched person.

The stags in the Greek epigram, whose
knees were clogged with frozen snow upon
the mountains, came down to the brooks of
the valleys, hoping to thaw their joints with
the waters of the stream ; but there the frost
overtook them, and bound them fast in ice
till the young herdsman took them in their
stranger snare. It is the unhappy chance of
many men, finding many inconveniences upon
the mountains of single life, they descend into
the valleys of marriage to refresh their troub-
les, and there they enter into fetters, and are
bound to sorrow by the cords of a man's or
woman's peevishness. And the worst of the
evil is, they are to thank their own follies ; for
they fell into the snare by entering an im-
proper way. Christ and the Church were no
ingredients in their choice. But as the Indian
women enter into folly for the price of an ele-
phant, and think their crime warrantable, so

MARRIAGE. 113

do men and women change their hberty for a
rich fortune, (Hke Eriphyle the Argive, she
preferred gold before a good man,) and show
themselves to be less than money, by overvalu-
ing that to all the content and wise felicity of
their lives : and when they have counted the
money and their sorrows together, how will-
ingly would they buy, with the loss of all that
money, modesty, or sweet nature, to their rela-
tive ! The odd thousand pounds would gladly
be allowed in good-nature and fair manners.

As very a fool is he that chooses for beauty
principally ; " cui sunt eruditi oculi, et stulta
mens " (as one said), whose eyes are witty, and
their souls sensual. It is an ill band of affections
to tie two hearts together by a little thread of
red and white. And they can love no longer but
until the next ague comes ; and they are fond
of each other, but, at the chance of fancy, or
the small-pox, or childbearing, or care, or time,
or anything that can destroy a pretty flower.

Man and wife are equally concerned to avoid
all offences of each other in the beginning of
their conversation. Every little thing can
blast an infant blossom ; and the breath of
the south can shake the little rings of the vine,
when first they begin to curl like the locks of
a new-weaned boy ; but when by age and con-
solidation they stiffen into the hardness of a
stem, and have by the warm embraces of the

114 MARRIAGE.

sun, and the kisses of heaven, brought forth
their clusters, they can endure the storms of
the north, and the loud noises of a tempest,
and yet never be broken. So are the early
unions of an unfixed marriage ; watchful and
observant, jealous and busy, inquisitive and
careful, and apt to take alarm at every unkind
word. For infirmities do not manifest them-
selves in the first scenes, but in the succession
of a long society ; and it is not chance or weak-
ness when it appears at first, but it is want of
love or prudence, or it will be so expounded ;
and that which appears ill at first, usually af-
frights the inexperienced man or woman, who
makes unequal conjectures, and fancies mighty
sorrows by the proportions of the new and
early unkindness. It is a very great passion,
or a huge folly, or a certain want of love, that
cannot preserve the colors and beauties of
kindness so long as public honesty requires a
man to wear their sorrows for the death of a
friend.

Plutarch compares a new marriage to a ves-
sel before the hoops are on ; everything dis-
solves their tender compaginations : but when
the joints are stiffened and are tied by a firm
compliance and proportioned bending, scarcely
can it be dissolved without fire or the violence
of iron. After the hearts of the man and the
wife are endeared and hardened by a mutual

MARRIAGE. 115

confidence, and experience longer than artifice
and pretence can last, there are a great many
remembrances, and some things present, that
dash all httle unkindnesses in pieces. The
httle boy m the Greek epigram, that was
creeping down a precipice, was invited to his
safety by the sight of his mother's pap, when
nothing else could entice him to return : and
the bond of common children, and the sight
of her that niu'ses what is most dear to him,
and the endearments of each other in the
course of a long society, and the same rela-
tion, is an excellent security to redintegrate
and to call that love back, which folly and
triflino; accidents would disturb. When it is
come thus far, it is hard unt■\^^sting the
knot ; but be cai'eful in its first coalition
that there be no rudeness done ; for if there
be, it will forever after be apt to start and
to be diseased.

Let man and wife be careful to stifle little
things, that as fast as they spring they be cut
down and trod upon ; for if they be suffered
to groAv by numbers, they make the spirit
peevish, and the society troublesome, and the
affections loose and easy by an habitual aver-
sation. Some men are more vexed with a
fly than with a wound ; and when the gnats
disturb our sleep, and the reason is disquieted,
but not perfectly awakened, it is often seen

116 MARRIAGE.

that he is fuller of trouble than if, in the
daylight of his reason, he were to contest
with a potent enemy. In the frequent little
accidents of a family, a man's reason cannot
always he awake ; and when his discourses
are imperfect, and a trifling trouble makes
him yet more restless, he is soon betrayed to
the violence of passion. It is certain that
the man or woman are in a state of weak-
ness and folly then, when they can be troub-
led with a trifling accident ; and therefore
it is not good to tempt their affections when
they are in that state of danger. In this
case the caution is, to subtract fuel from the
sudden flame ; for stubble, though it be quickly
kindled, yet it is as soon exting-uished, if it be
not blown by a pertinacious breath, or fed with
new materials. Add no new provocations to
the accident, and do not inflame this, and peace
will soon return, and the discontent will pass
away soon, as the sparks from the collision of
a fhnt ; ever remembering, that discontents
proceeding from daily little things do breed
a secret imdiscemible disease, which is more
dangerous than a fever proceeding from a dis-
cerned notorious surfeit.

Let them be sure to abstain from all those
things which by experience and observation
they find to be contrary to each other. They
that govern elephants, never appear before

MARRIAGE. 117

them in white ; and the masters of bulls keep
from them all garments of blood and scarlet, as
knowing that they will be impatient of civil
usages and discipline when their natm-es are
provoked by their proper antipathies. The
ancients in their marital hieroglyphics used to
depict Mercury standing by Venus, to signify
that by fair language and sweet entreaties the
minds of each other should be united ; and
hard by them, " suadam et gratias descripse-
runt,^^ they would have all dehciousness of
manners, compliance and mutual observance
to abide.

Let the husband and vsdfe infinitely avoid
a cmnous distmction of mine and thine ; for
this hath caused all the laws, and all the
suits, and all the wars in the world. Let
them who have bvit one person have also
but one interest. Corvuius dwells in a farm
and receives all its profits, and reaps and
sows as he pleases, and eats of the com and
drinks of the wine ; it is his own : but all that
also is his lord's, and for it Corvinus pays
acknowledgment ; and his patron hath such
powers and uses of it as are proper to the
lords ; and yet for all this, it may be the king's
too, to all the purposes that he can need, and
is all to be accounted in the census, and for
certain services and times of danger. So are
the riches of a family ; they are a woman's as

118 MARRIAGE.

well as a man's ; they are hers for need, and
hers for ornament, and hers for modest de-
light, and for the uses of religion and prudent
charity : but the disposing them into portions
of inheritance, the assignation of charges and
governments, stipends and rewards, annuities
and greater donatives, are the reserves of the
superior right, and not to be invaded by the
under-possessors.

As the earth, the mother of all creatures
here below, sends up all its vapors and proper
emissions at the command of the sun, and yet
requires them again to refresh her own needs,
and they are deposited between them both, in
the bosom of a cloud, as a common receptacle,
that they may cool his flames, and yet descend
to make her fruitful : so are the proprieties
of a wife to be disposed of by her lord ; and
yet all are for her provision, it being a part of
his need to refresh and supply hers, and it
serves the interest of both while it serves the
necessities of either.

These are the duties of them both, which
have common regards and equal necessities and
obligations ; and indeed there is scarce any
matter of duty, but it concerns them both alike,
and is only distinguished by names, and hath
its variety by circumstances and little acci-
dents : and what in one is called love, in the
other is called reverence ; and what in the wife

MARRIAGE. 119

is obedience, the same in the man is duty. He
provides, and she dispenses ; he gives com-
mandments, and she rules by them ; he rules
her by authority, and she rules him by love ;
she ought by all means to please him, and he
must by no means displease her. For as the
heart is set in the midst of the body, and
though it strikes to one side by the preroga-
tive of nature, yet those throbs and constant
motions are felt on the other side also, and the
influence is equal to both : so it is in conjugal
duties ; some motions are to the one side more
than to the other, but the interest is on both,
and the duty is equal in the several instances.

The next inquiry is more particular, and
considers the power and duty of the man.
" Let every one of you so love his wife, even
as himself" ; she is as himself, the man hath
power over her as over himself, and must love
her equally. A husband's power over his wife
is paternal and friendly, not magisterial and des-
''potic. The wife is '■'■ in perpetud tuteld,''^ under
conduct and counsel ; for the power a man
hath is founded in the understanding, not in
the will or force ; it is not a power of coercion,
but a power of advice, and that government
that wise men have over those who are fit to
be conducted by them. Thou art to be a
father and a mother to her, and a brother:
and great reason, unless the state of marriage

120 MARRIAGE.

should be no better than the condition of an
orphan. For she that is bound to leave father
and mother and brother for thee, either is mis-
erable, like a poor fatherless child, or else
ought to find all these, and more, in thee.

The dominion of a man over his wife is no
other than as the soul rules the body ; for
which it takes a mighty care, and uses it with
a delicate tenderness, and cares for it in all
contingencies, and watches to keep it from all
evils, and studies to make for it fan' provisions,
and very often is led by its inclinations and
desires, and does never contradict its appetites
but when they are evil, and then also not with-
out some trouble and sorrow ; and its govern-
ment comes only to this : it furnishes the body
with light and understanding, and the body
furnishes the soul with hands and feet ; the
soul governs because the body cannot else be
happy, but the government is no other than
provision ; as a nurse governs a child when
she causes him to eat, and to be warm, and ••
dry, and quiet. And yet even the very gov-
ernment itself is divided ; for man and wife in
the family are as the sun and moon in the
firmament of heaven ; he rules by day, and she
by night, that is, in the lesser and more proper
circles of her affaii's, in the conduct of domes-
tic provisions and necessary offices, and shines
only by his light, and rules by his authority.

MARRIAGE. 121

And as the moon in opposition to the sun
shines brightest, that is, then when she is in
her own circles and separate regions, so is the
authority of the wife then most conspicuous
when she is separate and in her proper sphere ;
"zn gi/nceeeo" in the nursery and offices of do-
mestic employment. But when she is in con-
junction with the sun her brother, that is, in
that place and employment in which his care
and proper offices are employed, her light is
not seen, her authority hath no proper busi-
ness. But else there is no difference ; for they
were barbarous people among whom wives
were instead of servants ; and it is a sign of
impotency and weakness to force the camels
to kneel for their load, because thou hast not
spirit and strength enough to climb : to make
the affections and evenness of a wife bend by
the flexures of a servant, is a sign the man
is not wise enough to govern when another
stands by. And as amongst men and women
humility is the way to be preferred, so it is
in husbands ; they shall prevail by cession, by
sweetness and counsel, and charity and com-
pliance. So that we cannot discourse of the
man's right without describing the measures
of his duty ; that, therefore, follows next.

" Let him love his wife even as himself" : —
that is his duty, and the measure of it too ;
which is so plain, that, if he understands how

122 MARRIAGE.

he treats liimself, there needs nothing be added
concermng; his demeanor towards her, save
only that we add the particulars in which
holy Scripture instances this general com-
mandment.

The first is, " Be not bitter against her " ;
and this is the least index and signification of
love ; a civil man is never bitter against a
friend or a stranger, much less to him that
enters under his roof, and is secured by the
laws of hospitality. But a wife does all that
and more : she quits all her interest for his
love ; she gives him all that she can give ; she
is much the same person as another can be the
same, who is conjoined by love and mystery
and religion, and all that is sacred and profane.
They have the same fortune, the same family,
the same children, the same religion, the same
interest, the same flesh ; and therefore the
Apostle urges, " No man hateth his own flesh,
but nourisheth and cherisheth it " ; and he cer-
tainly is strangely sacrilegious and a violator
of the rights of hospitality and sanctuary, who
uses her rudely, who is fled for protection not
only to his house, but also to his heart and
bosom.

There is nothing can please a man without
love ; and if a man be weary of the wise dis-
courses of the Apostles, and of the innocency
of an even and a private fortune, or hates peace

MARRIAGE. ' 123

or a fimltfiil year, lie hath reaped thorns and
thistles from the choicest flowers of paradise ;
for nothing can sweeten fehcity itself, bait love.
But when a man dwells in love, then the breasts
of his wife are pleasant as the di'oppings upon
the hill of Hermon, her eyes are fair as the
light of heaven, she is a foimtain sealed, and he
can quench his thirst, and ease liis cares, and lay
his sorrow down upon her lap, and can retire
home as to his sanctuary and refectory, and his
gardens of sweetness and chaste reli'eshments.

No man can tell but he that loves his chil-
dren, how many delicious accents make a man's
heart dance in the pretty conversation of those
dear pledges ; their childislmess, then* stam-
mering, their little angers, their innocence,
their imperfections, their necessities, are so
many little emanations of joy and comfort to
him that dehghts in theu' persons and society.
But he that loves not his wife and children
feeds a honess at home, and broods a nest of
sorrows ; and blessing itself cannot make liim
happy : so that all the commandments of God
enjoining a man to love his wife are nothing
but so many necessities and capacities of joy.
She that is loved is safe, and he that loves is
joyftd.

The husband should nourish and cherish her ;
he should refresh her sorrows and entice her
fears into confidence and pretty arts of rest.

124 MARRIAGE.

But it Avill concern the prudence of the hus-
band's love to make the cares and evils as
simple and easy as he can, by doubling the joys
and acts of a careful friendship, by tolerating
her infirmities, (because by so doing he either
cures her, or makes himself better,) by fairly
expounding all the little traverses of society
and communication, by taking everything by
the right handle, as Plutarch's expression is;
for there is nothing but may be misinterpreted ;
and yet if it be capable of a fair construction,
it is the office of love to make it. Love will
account that to be well said which, it may be,
was not so intended ; and then it may cause it
to be so, another time.

Hither also is to be referred that he secure
the interest of her virtue and felicity by a fair
example ; for a wife to a husband is a line or
superficies, — it hath dimensions of its own, but
no motion or proper affections ; but commonly
puts on such images of virtues or vices as are
presented to her by her husband's idea : and if
thou beest vicious, complain not that she is
infected that lies in thy bosom ; the interest of
whose love ties her to transcribe thy copy, and
write after the character of thy manners. Paris
was a man of pleasure, and Helena was an
adulteress, and she added covetousness upon
her own account. But Ulysses was a prudent
man, and a wary coimsellor, sober and severe ;

MARRIAGE. 125

and he efformed liis wife into such imagery as
he desired ; and she was chaste as the snows
upon the momitains, dihgent as the fatal sisters,
always busy, and always faithful ; she had a
lazy tongue and a busy hand.

Above all the instances of love let him pre-
serve towards her an inviolable faith, and an
unspotted chastity ; for tliis is the marriage-rmg ;
it ties two hearts by an eternal band ; it is like
the cherubim's flaming sword, set for the guard
of paradise ; he that passes into that garden,
now that it is immured by Christ and the
Church, enters into the shades of death. No
man must touch the forbidden tree, that in the
midst of the garden, which is the tree of knowl-
edge and life. Chastity is the secm'ity of love,
and preserves all the mysteriousness like the
secrets of a temple. Under this lock is deposit-
ed security of families, the miion of affections,
the repairer of accidental breaches. This is a
grace that is shut up and secured by all arts of
heaven and the defence of laws, the locks and
bars of modesty, by honor and reputation, by
fear and shame, by interest and high regards ;
and that contract that is intended to be forever
is yet dissolved and broken by the violation of
this. Nothing but death can do so much evil
to the holy rites of marriage as unchastity and
breach of faith can ; and by the laws of the Ro-
mans a man might kill his daughter or his wife,

126 MARRIAGE.

if he surprised her in the breach of her holy
vows, which are as sacred as the threads of hfe,
secret as the privacies of the sanctuary, and
holy as the society of angels. God that com-
manded us to forgive our enemies left it in our
choice, and hath not commanded us to forgive
an adulterous husband or a wife ; but the oflFend-
ed party's displeasure may pass into an eternal
separation of society and friendship. Now in
this grace it is fit that the wisdom and severity
of the man should hold forth a pure taper, that
his wife may, by seeing the beauties and trans-
parency of that crystal, dress her mind and her
body by the light of so pure reflections. It is
certain he will expect it fi'om the modesty and
retirement, from the passive nature and colder
temper, from the humility and fear, from the
honor and love, of his wife, that she be pure
as the eye of heaven : and therefore it is but
reason that the wisdom and nobleness, the love
and confidence, the strength and severity of the
man should be as holy and certain in this grace
as he is a severe exactor of it at her hands,
who can more easily be tempted by another,
and less by herself.

These are the little lines of a man's duty,
which, like threads of light from the body of
the sun, do clearly describe all the regions of
his proper obligations. Now, concerning the
woman's duty, although it consists in doing

MARRIAGE. 127

whatsoever her husband commands, and so
receh'es measures from the rules of his gov-
ernment, yet there are also some hues of life
depicted upon her hands, by which she may
read and know how to proportion out her duty
to her husband.

The first is obedience. The man's author-
ity is love, and the woman's love is obedience ;
for this obedience is no way founded in fear,
but in love and reverence. We will add, that
it is an effect of that modesty which, like ru-
bies, adorns the necks and cheeks of women.
It is modesty to advance and highly to honor
them who have honored us by making us to
be the companions of their dearest excellen-
cies ; for the woman that went before the man
in the way of death, is commanded to follow
him in the way of love ; and that makes the
society to be perfect, and the union profitable,
and the harmony complete. A wife never can
become equal but by obeying. A ruling wom-
an is intolerable. But that is not all ; for she
is miserable, too : for it is a sad calamity for a
woman to be joined to a fool or a weak person ;
it is like a giuird of geese to keep the capitol ;
or as if a flock of sheep should read grave lec-
tures to their shepherd, and give him orders
when he shall conduct them to pasture. To
be ruled by weaker people, to have a fool to
one's master, is the fate of miserable and un-

128 MARRIAGE.

blessed people : and the wife can be no ways
happy unless she be governed by a prudent
lord, whose commands are sober covmsels,
whose authority is paternal, whose orders are
provisions, and whose sentences are charity.

The next line of the woman's duty is com-
pliance, which St. Peter calls " the hidden
man of the heart, the ornament of a meek
and a quiet spirit " ; and to it he opposes " the
outward and pompous ornament of the body " ;
concerning Avhich, as there can be no partic-
ular measure set down to all persons, but the
proportions were to be measured by the cus-
toms of wise people, the quality of the woman,
and the desires of the man ; yet it is to be
limited by Christian modesty and the usages
of the more excellent and severe matrons.
Menander in the comedy brings in a man turn-
ing his wife from his house because she stained
her hair yellow, which was then the beauty.
A wise woman should not paint. A studious
gallantry in clothes cannot make a wise man
love his wife the better. Such gayeties are
fit for tragedies, but not for the uses of life.
" Decor occultus, et teeta venustas " ; that is the
Christian woman's fineness, the hidden man of
the heart, sweetness of manners, humble com-
portment, fair interpretation of all addresses,
ready compliances, high opinion of him, and
mean of herself.

MARRIAGE. 129

To partake secretly, and in her heart, of all
his joys and sorrows ; to believe him comely
and fair, though the sun hath dra\vn a cypress
over him ; (for as marriages are not to be con-
tracted by the hands and eye, but with reason
and the hearts, so are these judgments to be
made by the mind, not by the sight ;) and dia-
monds cannot make the woman virtuous, nor
him to value her who sees her put them off,
then, when charity and modesty are her bright-
est ornaments.

And indeed those husbands that are pleased
with indecent gayeties of their wives, are like
fishes taken with ointments and intoxicating
baits, apt and easy for sport and mockery, but
useless for food ; and Avhen Circe had turned
Ulysses's companions into hogs and monkeys,
by pleasures and the enchantments of her brav-
ery and luxury, they were no longer usefiil
to her, she knew not what to do with them ;
but on wise Ulysses she was continually en-
amoured. Indeed the outward ornament is fit
to take fools, but they are not worth the tak-
ing ; but she that hath a wise husband must
entice him to an eternal deamess by the veil
of modesty, and the grave robes of chastity,
the ornament of meekness, and the jewels of
faith and charity : she must have no '-'•fucus "
but blushings ; her brightness must be purity,
and she must shine round about with sweet-
9

130 MARRIAGE.

nesses and friendship, and she shall be pleasant
while she lives, and desired when she dies. If
not, her grave shall be full of rottenness and
dishonor, and her memory shall be worse after
she is dead : " after she is dead " ; for that will
be the end of all merry meetings ; and I choose
this to be the last advice to both.

Remember the days of darkness, for they
are many ; the joys of the bridal chambers are
quickly past, and the remaining portion of the
state is a dvill progress, without variety of joys,
but not without the change of sorrows ; but
that portion that shall enter into the grave
must be eternal. It is fit that I should infuse
a bunch of myrrh into the festival goblet, and
after the Egyptian manner serve up a dead
man's bones at a feast ; I will only show it,
and take it away again ; it will make the wine
bitter, but wholesome. But those married
pairs that hve, as remembering that they
must part again, and give an account how
they treat themselves and each other, shall
at that day of their death be admitted to
glorious espousals ; and then they shall hve
again, be married to their Lord, and partake
of his glories, with Abraham and Joseph, St.
Peter and St. Paul, and all the mamed saints.

All those tilings that now please us shall
pass from us, or we from them ; but those
things that concern the other life are per-

THE ATHEIST. 131

manent as the numbers of eternity : and al-
though at the resurrection there shall be no
relation of husband and wife, and no mar-
riage shall be celebrated but the marriao;e
of the Lamb ; yet then shall be remembered
how men and women passed through this
state, which is a type of that ; and from this
sacramental union all holy pairs shall pass to
the spiritual and eternal, where love shall be
their portion, and joys shall crown then* heads,
and they shall lie in the bosom of Jesus, and
in the heart of God to eternal affes.

THE ATHEIST.

\T7H0 in the world is a verier fool, a more
* ' ignorant, wretched person, than he that
is an atheist ? A man may better believe
there is no such man as himself, and that he
is not in being, than that there is no God ;
for himself can cease to be, and once was not,
and shall be changed from what he is, and in
very many periods of his life knows not that
he is ; and so it is every night with him when
he sleeps. But noiie of these can happen to
God ; and if he knows it not, he is a fool.
Can anything in this world be more foolish
than to think that all this rare fabric of heaven

132 THE ATHEIST.

and earth can come by chance, when all the
skill of art is not able to make an oyster ?
To see rare effects and no cause ; an excel-
lent govBrnment and no prmce ; a motion with-
out an immovable ; a circle without a centre ;
a time without eternity ; a second without a
first ; a thing that begins not from itself, and
therefore not to perceive there is something
from whence it does begin, which must be
without beginning ; these things are so against
philosophy and natural reason, that he must
needs be a beast in his understanding that does
not assent to them. This is the atheist: " The
fool hath said in liis heart there is no God " ;
that is his character. The thing framed says
that nothing framed it ; the tongue never made
itself to speak, and yet talks against him that
did ; saying, that which is made is, and that
which made it is not. But this folly is as
infinite as hell, as much without light or bound
as the chaos or primitive nothing. But in this
the devil never prevailed very far ; his schools
were always thin at these lectures. Some
few people have been witty against God, that
taught them to speak before they knew how to
spell a syllable ; but either they are monsters
in their manners, or mad in their understand-
ings, or ever find themselves confuted by a
thunder or a plague, by danger or death.

THE TONGUE. 133

THE TONGUE.

T) Y the use of the tongue, God hath distin-
^ guished us fi'om beasts ; and by the well
or ill usino; it we are distinguished fi-om one
another ; and therefore though silence be inno-
cent as death, harmless as a rose's breath to a
distant passenger, yet it is rather the state of
death than life ; and therefore when the Egyp-
tians sacrificed to Harpocrates their god of
silence, in the midst of their rites they cried
out, " The tongue is an angel," good or bad,
that is, as it happens. Silence was to them a
god, but the tongue is greater ; it is the band
of human intercourse, and makes men apt to
unite in societies and republics ; and I remem-
ber what one of the ancients said, that we are
better in the company of a known dog than of
a man whose speech is not known. A stranger
to a stranger in his language is not as a man
to a man ; for by voices and homilies, by ques-
tions and answers, by narratives and invectives,
by counsel and reproof, by praises and hymns,
by prayers and glorifications, we serve God's
glory and the necessities of men ; and by the
tongue our tables are made to differ from man-
gers, our cities from deserts, our churches' from
herds of beasts and flocks of sheep.

But the tongue is a fountain both of bitter

134 THE TONGUE.

waters and of pleasant ; it sends forth blessing
and cursing ; it praises God, and rails at men ;
it is sometimes set on fire, and then it puts
whole cities in combustion ; it is unruly, and no
more to be restramed than the breath of a tem-
pest ; it is volatile and fugitive : reason should
go before it ; and, when it does not, repentance
comes after it ; it was intended for an organ of
the divine praises, but the devil often plays
upon it, and then it sounds like the screech-
owl, or the groans of death ; sorrow and shame,
folly and repentance, are the notes and formi-
dable accents of that discord.

He that loves to talk much, must scrape
materials together to furnish out the scenes
and long orations ; and some talk themselves
into anger, and some furnish out their dialogues
with the lives of others ; either they detract
or censure, or they flatter themselves, and tell
their own stories with friendly circumstances ;
and pride creeps up the sides of the discourse,
and the man entertains liis friend with his own
panegyric ; or the discourse looks one way and
rows another, and more minds the design than
its own truth ; and most commonly will be so
ordered that it shall please the company.

* IDLE TALK. 135

IDLE TALK.

T ET no man think it a light matter that he
-'-^ spends his precious time in idle words ; let
no man be so weary of what flies away too fast,
and cannot be recalled, as to use arts and de-
vices to pass the time away m vanity, which
might be rarely spent in the interests of eter-
nity. Time is given us to repent in, to appease
the divine anger, to prepare for and hasten to
the society of angels, to stir up our slackened
wills, and enkindle ou^r cold devotions, to weep
for our daily iniquities, and to sigh after, and
work for, the restitution of our lost inheritance ;
and the reward is very inconsiderable that ex-
changes all this for the pleasiu-e of a voluble
tonsue : and mdeed this is an evil that cannot
be avoided by any excuse that can be made for
words that are in any sense idle, though in all
senses of their own nature and proper relations
they be innocent. They are a throwing away
something of that which is to be expended for
eternity, and put on degi-ees of folly accordmg
as they are tedious and expensive of tune to no
good purposes.

Great knowledge, if it be without vanity, is
the most severe bridle of the tonorie. For so
have I heard that all the noises and prating of
the pool, the croaking of frogs and toads, is

136 IDLE TALK*

hushed and appeased upon the instant of bring-
ing upon them the hght of a candle or torch.
Every beam of reason and raj of knowledge
checks the dissolutions of the tongue. But,
every man as he is a fool and contemptible, so
his tongue is hanged loose, being like a bell,
in which there is nothing; but tonmie and noise.
No prudence is a sufficient g-uard, or can
always stand " in excubiis,^^ still watching,
when a man is in perpetual floods of talk : for
prudence attends after the manner of an angel's
ministry; it is despatched on messages from
God, and drives away enemies, and places
guards, and calls upon the man to awake, and
bids him send out spies and observers, and then
goes about his own ministries above : but an
angel does not sit by a man, as a nurse by the
baby's cradle, watching every motion, and the
lighting of a fly upon the child's hp. And so
is prudence ; it gives rules, and proportions out
our measures, and prescribes us cautions, and
by general influences orders our particulars :
but he that is given to talk cannot be secured
by all this ; the emissions of his tongue are
beyond the general figures and lines of rule ;
and he can no more be wise in every period of
a long and running talk than a lutanist can
deliberate and make every motion of his hand
by the division of his notes to be chosen and
distinctly voluntary. And hence it comes, that

IDLE TALK. 137

at every corner of the mouth a folly peeps out,
or a mischief creeps in. A little pride and a
great deal of vanity will soon escape, while the
man minds the sequel of his talk, and not that
ugliness of humor which the severe man that
stood by did observe and was ashamed of. Do
not many men talk themselves into anger,
screwing up themselves with dialogues of fancy,
till they forget the company and themselves ?
And some men hate to be contradicted or inter-
rupted, or to be discovered in their folly ; and
some men being a little conscious, and not
striving to amend by silence, they make it
worse by discourse. A long story of them-
selves, a tedious praise of another collaterally,
to do themselves advantage ; a declamation
against a sin, to imdo the person or oppress the
reputation of theu' neighbor ; unseasonable rep-
etition of that which neither profits nor delights ;
trifling contentions about a goat's beard or the
blood of an oyster, anger and animosity, spite
and rage, scorn and reproach, begiui upon ques-
tions which concern neither of the litigants ;
fierce disputations ; strivings for what is past,
and for what shall never be : these are the
events of the loose and unwary tongue, which
are like flies and gnats upon the margin of a
pool ; they do not sting like an asp, or bite deep
as a bear, yet they can vex a man into a fever
and impatience, and make him inca2)uble of
rest and comisel.

138 JESTING.

JESTING.

"PCCLESIASTICAL History reports that
-^ many jests passed between St. Anthony,
the father of the Hermits, and his scholar St.
Paul ; and St. Hilarion is reported to have
been very pleasant, and of facetious, sweet,
and more lively conversation ; and indeed plais-
ance, and joy, and a lively spirit, and a pleas-
ant conversation, and the innocent caresses of
a charitable humanity, is not forbidden ; and
here in my text our conversation is commanded
to be such, that it may minister grace, that
is, favor, complacence, cheerfulness, and be
acceptable and pleasant to the hearer : and so
must be our conversation ; it must be as far
from sullenness as it ought to be from light-
ness, and a cheei-fid spirit is the best convoy
for religion ; and though sadness does in some
cases become a Christian, as being an index of
a pious mind, of compassion, and a wise, proper
resentment of things, yet it serves but one end,
being useful in the only instance of repent-
ance ; and hath done its greatest works, not
when it weeps and sighs, but when it hates and
grows careful against sin. But cheerfulness
and a festival spirit fills the soul full of har-
mony, it composes music for churches and
hearts, it makes and publishes glorifications of

JESTING. 139

God, it produces thankfulness and serves the
end of charity; and when the oil of gladness
runs over, it makes bright and tall emissions of
light and holy fires, reaching up to a cloud,
and making joy round about. And therefore,
since it is so innocent, and may be so pious
and full of holy advantage, whatsoever can
innocently minister to this holy joy does set
forward the work of religion and charity. And
indeed charity itself, which is the vertical top
of all religion, is nothing else but a union of
joys, concentred in the heart, and reflected
from all the angles of our life and intercourse.
It is a rejoicing in God, a gladness in our
neighbor's good, a pleasure in doing good, a
rejoicing with him ; and without love we can-
not have any joy at all. It is this that makes
childi-en to be a pleasure, and friendship to be
so noble and divine a thing ; and upon this
account it is certain that all that which can
innocently make a man cheerful does also
make him charitable ; for grief, and age, and
sickness, and weariness, these are peevish and
troublesome ; but mirth and cheerfulness is
content, and civil, and compliant, and com-
municative, and loves to do good, and swells
up to felicity only upon the wings of charity.
Upon this account here is pleasure enough for
a Christian at present ; and if a facetious dis-
course, and an amicable friendly mirth, can

140 COMMON SWEARING.

refresh the spirit, and take it off from the vile
temptation of peevish, despairing, uncomplying
melancholy, it must needs be innocent and
commendable. And we may as well be re-
freshed by a clean and a brisk discourse as by
the air of Campanian wines ; and our faces and
our heads may as well be anointed and look
pleasant with wit and friendly intercourse as
with the fat of the balsam-tree ; and such a
conversation no wise man ever did or ouo-ht to
reprove. But when the jest hath teeth and
nails, biting or scratching our brother, when
it is loose and wanton, when it is unseasonable,
and much, or many, when it serves ill pur-
poses, or spends better time, then it is the
drunkenness of the soul, and makes the spirit
fly away, seeking for a temple where the mirth
and the music is solemn and religious.

COMMON SWEAEING.

A GAINST common swearing, St. Chrysos-
■^-^ torn spends twenty homilies : and by the
number and weight of arguments hath left this
testimony, that it is a foolish vice, but hard to
be cured ; infinitely unreasonable, but strangely
prevailing ; almost as much without remedy as
it is without pleasure ; for it enters first by

COMMON SWEARING. 141

folly, and grows by custom, and dwells with
carelessness, and is nursed by irreligion and
want of the fear of God. It profanes the most
holy things, and mingles dirt with the beams of
the sun, follies and trifling talk interweaved
and knit together with the sacred name of God.
It placeth the most excellent of things in the
meanest and basest cii'cumstances ; it brings
the secrets of heaven into the streets, dead
men's bones into the temple. Nothing is a
greater sacrilege than to prostitute the great
name of God to the petulancy of an idle
tongue, and blend it as an expletive to fill up
the emptiness of a weak discourse. The name
of God is so sacred, so mi^htv, that it rends
mountains ; it opens the bowels of the deepest
rocks, it casts out devils, and makes hell to
tremble, and fills all the regions of heaven
with joy. The name of God is our strength
and confidence, the object of our worshippings,
and the security of all our hopes ; and when
God had given himself a name, and immured
it with dread and reverence, like the garden
of Eden with the swords of cherubims, none
durst speak it but he whose lips were hallowed,
and that at holy and solemn times, in a most
holy and solemn place.

142 FLATTERY.

FLATTERY.

npmS is the mischief that is done by flattery ;
-^ it is a design against the wisdom, against
the repentance, against the growth and promo-
tion of a man's souL He that persuades an
ugly, deformed man, that he is handsome, a
short man that he is tall, a bald man that he
hath a good head of hair, makes him to become
ridiculous and a fool, but does no other mischief.
But he that persuades his friend that is a goat
in his manners, that he is a holy and a chaste
person, or that his looseness is a sign of a quick
spirit, or that it is not dangerous but easily par-
donable, a trick of youth, a habit that old age
will lay aside, as a man pares his nails, this
man hath given great advantage to his friend's
mischief; he hath made it grow in all the
dimensions of the sin, till it grows intolerable,
and pei-haps unpardonable. And let it be con-
sidered, what a fearful destruction and contra-
diction of friendship or service it is, so to love
myself and my little interest, as to pi-efer it
before the soul of him whom I ought to love.
Carneades said bitterly, but it had in it too
many degrees of truth, that princes and great
personages never learn to do anything per-
fectly well but to ride the great horse, because
the proud beast knows not how to flatter, but

CONSOLATION. 143

will as soon throw him off from his back as he
will shake off the son of a porter. But a flat-
terer is Hke a neighing horse, that neigheth
under every rider, and is pleased with every-
thing, and commends all that he sees, and
tempts to mischief, and cares not, so his friend
may but perish pleasantly. And indeed that is
a calamity that undoes many a soul; we so
love our peace, and sit so easily upon our own
good opinions, and are so apt to flatter our-
selves, and lean upon our o^ai false supports,
that we cannot endure to be disturbed or awak-
ened from our pleasing lethargy. For we care
not to be safe, but to be secure ; not to escape
hell, but to hve pleasantly ; we are not solici-
tous of the event, but of the way thither ; and
it is sufiicient if we be persuaded all is well ;
in the mean time we are careless whether in-
deed it be so or no, and therefore we give pen-
sions to fools and vile persons to abuse us, and
cozen us of fehcity.

CONSOLATION.

f^ OD glories in the appellative that he is the
^ Father of mercies, and the God of all com-
fort, and therefore to minister in the office is to
become like God, and to imitate the charities

144 CONSOLATION.

of heaven ; and God hath fitted mankind for
it ; he most needs it, and he feels his brother's
wants by his own experience; and God hath
given us speech and the endearments of soci-
ety, and pleasantness of conversation, and pow-
ers of seasonable discourse, arguments to allay
the sorrow, by abating our apprehensions, and
taking out the sting, or telling the periods of
comfort, or exciting hope, or urging a precept,
and reconciling our affections, and reciting
promises, or telling stories of the divine mercy,
or changing it into duty, or making the burden
less by comparing it with greater, or by prov-
ing it to be less than we deserve, and that it is
so intended, and may become the instrument
of virtue. And certain it is, that as nothing
can better do it, so there is nothing greater
for which God made our tongues, next to recit-
ing his praises, than to minister comfort to a
weary soul. And what greater measure can
we have than that we should bring joy to our
brother, who with his dreary eyes looks to
heaven and round about, and cannot find so
much rest as to lay his eyelids close together,
than that thy tongue should be tuned with
heavenly accents, and make the weary soul to
listen for light and ease ; and when he per-
ceives that there is such a thing in the world,
and in the order of things, as comfort and joy,
to begin to break out fi-om the prison of his

CONSOLATION. 145

ft

sorrows at the door of sighs and tears, and by
Httle and httle melt into showers and refresh-
ment ? This is glory to thy voice, and employ-
ment fit for the brightest angel.

But so have I seen the sun kiss the fi'ozen
earth, which was bound up with the images of
death and the colder breath of the north ; and
then the waters break from their enclosures,
and melt with joy, and run in useful channels ;
and the flies do rise again from their httle
graves in walls, and dance a while in the air,
to tell that there is joy within, and that the
great mother of creatures ydW. oj)en the stock
of her new refreshment, become usefiil to man-
kind, and sing praises to her Redeemer. So is
the heart of a sorrowftil man under the dis-
courses of a wise comforter ; he breaks from
the despairs of the grave and the fetters and
chains of sorrow, he blesses God, and he blesses
thee, and he feels his hfe returning ; for to be
miserable is death, but nothing is life but to be
comforted ; and God is pleased with no music
from below, so much as in the thanksgiving
songs of reheved widows, of supported or-
phans, of rejoicing and comforted and thank-
ftil persons.

This part of communication does the work
of God and of our neighbors, and bears us to
heaven in streams of joy made by the over-
flowings of our brother's comfort. It is a fear-
10

146 THE SPIRIT OF GRACE.

ful tiling to see a man despairing. None knows
the sorrow and the intolerable anguish but
themselves, and they that are damned ; and so
are all the loads of a wounded spirit, when the
staff of a man's broken fortune bows his head
to the ground, and sinks like an osier under
the violence of a mighty tempest. But there-
fore in proportion to this I may tell the excel-
lency of the employment, and the duty of that
charity, which bears the dying and languishing
soul from the fringes of hell to the seat of the
brightest stars, where God's face shines and
Reflects comforts forever and ever.

THE SPIRIT OF GRACE.

TN the law, God gave his spirit in small pro-
-*- portions, like the dew upon Gideon's fleece ;
a little portion was wet sometimes with the
dew of heaven, when all the earth besides was
dry. And the Jews called it '•'■filiam vocis,^^
the daughter of a voice, still, and small, and
seldom, and that by secret whispers, and some-
times inarticulate, by way of enthusiasm rather
than of instruction ; and God spake by the
prophets, transmitting the sound as through an
organ-pipe, things which themselves oftentimes
understood not. But in the gospel, the spirit

THE SPIRIT OF GRACE. 147

is given without measure ; first poured forth
upon our head Christ Jesus ; then descending
upon the beard of Aaron, the fathers of the
Church, and, thence falhng, Mke the tears of the
balsam of Judea, upon the foot of the plant,
upon the lowest of the people. And this is
given regvilarly to all that ask it, to all that can
receive it, and by a solemn ceremony, and con-
veyed by a sacrament : and is now, not the
daughter of a voice, but the mother of many
voices, of divided tongues, and united hearts ;
of the tongues of prophets, and the duty of.
saints; of the sermons of apostles, and the wis-
dom of governors. It is the parent of boldness
and fortitude to martyrs, the fountain of learn-
ing to doctors, an ocean of all things excellent
to all who are within the ship and bounds of
the catholic Church. So that old men and
young men, maidens and boys, the scribe and
the unlearned, the judge and the advocate, the
priest and the people, are full of the spirit, if
they belong to God. Moses's wish is fulfilled,
and all the Lord's people are prophets in some
sense or other.

A man that hath tasted of God's spirit can
instantly discern the madness that is in rage,
the folly and the disease that is in en\y, the
anguish and tediousness that is in lust, the dis-
honor that is in breakino; our faith and tellinjj
a lie ; and imderstands things truly as they

148 THE SPIRIT OF GRACE.

are ; that is, that charity is the greatest noble-
ness in the world ; that religion hath in it the
greatest pleasures ; that temperance is the best
security of health ; that humility is the surest
way to honor. And all these relishes are noth-
ing but antepasts of heaven, where the quintes-
sence of all these pleasures shall be swallowed
forever ; where the chaste shall follow the
Lamb, and the virgins sing there where the
mother of Jesus shall reign ; and the zealous
converters of souls, and the laborers in God's
vineyard, shall worship eternally ; where St.
Peter and St. Paul do wear their crowns of
righteousness ; and the patient persons shall be
rewarded with Job, and the meek persons with
Christ and Moses, and all with God. The very
expectation of which proceeded from a hope
begotten in us by the spirit of manifestation,
and bred up and strengthened by the spirit of
obsignation, is so delicious an entertainment of
all our reasonable appetites, that a spiritual
man can no more be removed or enticed from
the love of God and of religion than the moon
from her orb, or a mother from loving the son
of her joys and of her sorrows.

I have read of a spiritual person who saw
heaven but in a dream, but such as made great
impression upon him, and was represented with
vigorous and pertinacious phantasms not easily
disbanding; and when he awaked he knew not

THE SPIRIT OF GRACE. 149

his cell, he remembered not him that slept iii
the same dorture, nor could tell how night and
day were distinguished, nor could discern oil
from wine ; but called out for his vision again :
'' Redde mild campos meos Jloridos, columnam
auream, comitem Hieronymum^ assistentes ange-
los " ; Give me my fields again, my most deli-
cious fields, my pillar of a glorious light, my
companion St. Jerome, my assistant angels.
And this lasted till he was told of his duty,
and matter of obedience, and the fear of a
sin had disencharmed him, and caused him to
take care lest he lose the substance out of
greediness to possess the shadow.

Prayer is one of the noblest exercises of the
Christian religion ; or rather it is that duty in
which all graces are concentrated. Prayer is
charity, it is faith, it is a conformity to God's
will, a desiring according to the desires of
heaven, an imitation of Christ's intercession,
and prayer must suppose all holiness, or else
it is nothing : and therefore all that in which
men need God's spirit, all that is in order to
prayer. Baptism is but a prayer, and the holy
sacrament of the Lord's supper is but a prayer ;
a prayer of sacrifice representative, and a
prayer of oblation, and a prayer of intercession,
and a prayer of thanksgiving. And obedience
is a prayer, and begs and procures blessings.

150 THE GLORY OF GOD.

THE DECLINE OF CHRISTENDOM.

TT is a sad calamity that is fallen upon all the
^ Seven Churches (^ Asia, (to whom the spirit
of God wrote seven epistles hj Saint John,)
and almost all the churches of Africa, where
Christ was worshipped, and now Mahomet is
thrust in substitution, and the people are ser-
vants, and the religion is extinguished ; or where
it remains it shines like the moon in an eclipse,
or like the least spark of the Pleiades, seen but
seldom, and that rather shining Kke a glow-
worm than a taper enkindled with a beam of
the sun of righteousness.

THE GLORY OF GOD.

GOD is the eternal fountain of honor and the
spring of glory ; in him it dwells essen-
tially, from him it derives originally ; and when
an action is glorious, or a man is honorable, it
is because the action is pleasing to God, in the
relation of obedience or imitation, and because
the man is honored by God, and by God's vice-
gerent. And therefore God cannot be dishon-
ored, because all honor comes from himself;
he cannot but be glorified, because to be him-

TEE GLORY OF GOD. 151

self is to be infinitely glorious. And yet he is
pleased to say that our sins dishonor him, and
our obedience does glorify him. But as the
sun, the great eye of the world, prying into the
recesses of rocks and the hollowness of valleys,
receives species or visible forms from these
objects, but he beholds them only by that light
which proceeds from himself: so does God,
who is the light of that eye ; he receives re-
flexes and returns from us, and these he calls
glorifications of himself, but they are such
which are made so by his own gracious ac-
ceptation. For God cannot be glorified by
anything but by himself, and by his own in-
struments, which he makes as mirrors to reflect
his own excellency ; that, by seeing the glory
of such emanations, he may rejoice in his own
works, because they are images of his mfinity.
Thus when he made the beauteous frame of
heaven and earth, he rejoiced in it and glori-
fied himself ; because it was the glass in which
he beheld his wisdom and almighty power.
And when God destroyed the old world, in
that also he glorified himself; for in those
w^aters he saw the image of his justice, — they
were the looking-glass for that attribute.

All the actions of a holy life do constitute
the mass and body of all those instruments
whereby God is pleased to glorify himself. For
if God is glorified in the sun and moon, in the

152 DEATH-BED REPENTANCE.

rare fabric of the honey-combs, in the discipHne
of bees, in the economy of pismires, in the httle
houses of birds, in the curiosity of an eye, God
being pleased to dehght in those httle images
and reflexes of himself from those pretty mir-
rors, which, like a cre^dce in a wall, through a
narrow perspective transmit the species of a
vast excellency ; much rather shall God be
pleased to behold himself in the glasses of our
obedience, in the emissions of our will and
understanding ; these being rational and apt
instruments to express him, far better than
the natural, as being nearer communications
of himself.

DEATH-BED REPENTANCE.

OINCE repentance is a duty of so great and
^ giant-like bulk, let no man crowd it up into
so narrow room as that it be strangled in its
birth for want of time, and air to breathe in.
Let it not be put oflp to that time when a man
hath scarce time enough to reckon all those
particular duties which make up the integrity
of its constitution. Will any man hunt the
wild boar in his garden, or bait a bull in his
closet ? Will a woman wrap her child in her
handkerchief, or a father send his son to school

DEATH-BED REPENTANCE. 153

when lie is fifty years old ? These are mdecen-
cies of providence, and the instrument contra-
dicts the end : and this is our case. There is
no room for the repentance, no time to act all
its essential parts.

When God requu'es nothing of us but to live
soberly, justly, and godly, — which very things
of themselves to man are a very great felicity,
and necessary to his present well-being, —
shall we thinic this to be a load, and an insuf-
ferable bm-den ; and that heaven is so little a
purchase at that price, that God in mere justice
will take a death-bed sigh or groan, and a few
unprofitable tears and promises, in exchange
for all our duty ? Strange it should be so ; but
stranger that any man should rely upon such
a vanity, when from God's word he hath noth-
ing to warrant such a confidence. But these
men do hke the tyrant Dionysius, who stole
from Apollo his golden cloak and gave him a
cloak of Arcadian homespun, sa3ang that this
was lio-hter in summer and warmer in winter.
These men sacrilegiously rob God of the service
of all their golden days, and serve him in their
hoary head, in their furs and grave-clothes.

154 DECEITFULNESS OF TEE HEART.

DECEITFULNESS OF THE HEAET.

1I.TAN is helpless and vain ; of a condition so
-'-*-'- exposed to calamity, that a raisin is able to
kill him ; any trooper ont of the Egyptian
army, a fly, can do it, when it goes on God's
errand ; the most contemptible accident can
destroy him, the smallest chance affright him,
every future contingency, when but considered
as possible, can amaze him ; and he is encom-
passed with potent and mahcious enemies,
subtle and implacable.

The heart is deceitful m its strength ; and
when we have the growth of a man, we have
the weaknesses of a child. Nay, more yet, and
it is a sad consideration, the more we are in
age, the weaker in our courage. It appears in
the heats and forwardnesses of new converts,
which are like to the great emissions of heht-
ning, or like huge fires which flame and burn
without measure, even all that they can ; till
from flames they descend to still fires, from
thence to smoke, from smoke to embers, and
from thence to ashes, — cold and pale, like
ghosts, or the fantastic images of death. And
the Primitive Church were zealous in their re-
hgion up to the degree of cherubims, and would
run as greedily to the sword of the hangman,
to die for the cause of God, as we do now

DECEITFULNESS OF THE HEART. 155

to the greatest joy and entertainment of a
Christian spirit, — even to the receiving of the
holy sacrament. A man would think it rea-
sonable that the first infancy of Christianity
should, according to the nature of first begin-
nings, have been remiss, gentle, and inactive ;
and that, according as the object or evidence
of faith grew, which in every age hath a great
degree of argument superadded to its confir-
mation, so should the habit also and the grace ;
the longer it lasts, and the more objections it
runs through, it still should show a brighter
and more certain light to discover the divmity
of its principle ; and that, after the more ex-
amples, and new accidents and strangenesses
of Providence, and daily experience, and the
multitude of miracles, still the Christian should
grow more certain in his faith, more refreshed
in his hope, and warm in his charity ; the very
nature of these graces increasing and swelling
upon the very nourishment of experience, and
the multiplication of then* own acts. And yet,
because the heart of man is false, it suffers the
fires of the altar to go out, and the flames
lessen by the multitude of fuel. But, indeed,
it is because we put on strange fire, and put
out the fire upon our hearths by letting in a
glaring sunbeam, the fire of lust, or the heats
of an angry spirit, to quench the fire of God,
and suppress the sweet cloud of incense.

156 DECEITFULNESS OF THE HEART.

There is no greater argument in the world of
our spiritual weakness, and the falseness of our
hearts in the matters of religion, than the back-
wardness which most men have always, and all
men have sometimes, to say their prayers ; so
weary of their length, so glad when they are
done, so witty to excuse and frustrate an op-
portunity : and yet there is no manner of
trouble in the duty, no weariness of bones, no
violent labors ; nothing but begging a blessing,
and receiving it ; nothing but doing ourselves
the greatest honor of speaking to the greatest
person, and greatest king of the world : and
that we should be unwilling to do this, so un-
able to continue in it, so backward to return to
it, so without gust and relish in the doing it,
can have no visible reason in the nature of the
thing but something within us, a strange sick-
ness in the heart, a spiritual nauseating or
loathing of manna, something that hath no
name ; but we are sure that it comes from a
weak, a faint and false heart.

Epictetus tells us of a gentleman returning
from banishment, who, in his journey towards
home, called at his house, told a sad story of an
imprudent life, the greatest part of which being
now spent, he was resolved for the future to
live philosophically and entertain no biisiness,
to be candidate for no employment, not to go
to the court, not to salute Caesar with ambitious

DECEITFULNESS OF TEE HEART. 157

attendances, but to study, and worship the
gods, and die willingly when nature or neces-
sity called him. It may be, this man believed
himself; but Epictetus did not. And he had
reason : letters from Caesar met him at the
doors, and invited him to court ; and he forgot
all his promises which were warm upon his
lips, and grew pompous, secular, and ambi-
tious, and gave the gods thanks for his prefer-
ment. Thus many men leave the world when
their fortune hath left them ; and they are
severe and philosophical, and retired forever, if
forever it be impossible to return. But let a
prosperous sunshine warm and refresh their
sadnesses, and make it but possible to break
their purposes, and there needs no more temp-
tation ; their own false heart is enough ; they
are like Ephraim in the day of battle, starting
aside like a broken bow.

The heart is false, deceiving and deceived,
in its intentions and designs. A man hears the
precepts of God enjoining us to give alms of
all we possess ; he readily obeys with much
cheerfrilness and alacrity, and his charity, like
a fair-spreading tree, looks beauteously. But
there is a canker at the heart ; the man blows
a trumpet to call the poor together, and hopes
the neighborhood Avill take notice of his bounty.
Nay, he gives alms privately, and charges no
man to speak of it, and yet hopes by some

158 DECEITFULNESS OF THE HEART.

accident or other to be praised both for his
charity and humihty. And if, by chance, the
fame of his ahns come abroad, it is but his duty
to " let his light so shine before men" that
God may be glorified.

There is wrought upon the spirits of many
men great impressions by education, by a mod-
est and temperate natia'e, by human laws and
the customs and severities of sober persons,
and the fears of religion, and the awfulness of
a reverend man, and the several argu.ments
and endearments of virtue : and it is not in the
nature of some men to do an act in despite of
reason, and religion, and arguments, and rever-
ence, and modesty, and fear ; but men are
forced from their sin by the violence of the
grace of God, when they hear it speak. But
so a Roman gentleman kept off a whole band
of soldiers who were sent to murder him, and
his eloquence was stronger than their anger
and design : but, suddenly, a rude trooper
rushed upon him, who neither had nor would
hear him speak ; and he thrust his spear into
that throat whose music had charmed all his
fellows into peace and gentleness. So do we.
The grace of God is armor and defence enough
against the most violent incursion of the spirits
and the works of darkness ; but then we must
hear its excellent chamns, and consider its
reasons, and remember its precepts, and dwell

DECEITFULNESS OF THE HEART. 159

with its discourses. But this the heart of man
loves not.

Theocritus tells of a fisherriian that dreamed
he had taken a fish of gold, upon which being
overjoyed, he made a vow that he never would
fish more ; but when he waked, he soon de-
clared his vow to be null, because he fomid his
golden fish was escaped away through the holes
of his eyes when he first opened them. Just
so we do in the purposes of religion ; some-
times, in a good mood, we seem to, see heaven
opened, and all the streets of the heavenly
Jerusalem paved with gold and precious stones,
and we are ravished with spiritual apprehen-
sions, and resolve never to return to the low
affections of the world and the impure adher-
ences of sin. But when this flash of liD'htninff
is gone, and we converse again with the incli-
nations and habitual desires of our false hearts,
those other desires and fine considerations dis-
band, and the resolutions, taken in that pious
fit, melt into indifference and old customs.

The effect of all is this, that we are ignorant
of the things of God. We make religion to be
the work of a few hours in the whole year ; we
are without fancy or affection to the severities
of holy living ; we reduce religion to the be-
lieving of a few articles, and doing nothing that
is considerable ; we pray seldom, and then but
very coldly and indifferently ; we communicate

160 DECEITFULNESS OF THE HEART.

not SO often as the sun salutes both the tropics;
we profess Christ, but dare not die for him;
we are factious for a rehgion, and will not live
according to its precepts ; we call ourselves
Christians, and love to be ignorant of many of
the laws of Christ, lest our knowledge should
force us into shame, or into the troubles of a
holy life. All the mischiefs that you can sup-
pose to happen to a furious, inconsiderate per-
son, running after the wildfires of the night,
over rivers and rocks and precipices, without
sun or star, or angel or man, to guide him ; all
that, and ten thousand times worse, may you
suppose to be the certain lot of him who gives
himself up to the conduct of a passionate, blind
heart, whom no fire can warm, and no sun can
enlighten ; who hates light, and loves to dwell
in the remons of darkness.

The heart of man is strangely proud. If
men commend us, we think we have reason
to distinguish om'selves from others, since the
voice of discerning men hath already made the
separation. If men do not commend us, we
think they are stupid and understand us not ;
or envious, and hold their tongues in spite. If
we are praised by many, then " Vox popidi^ vox
Dei^^ Fame is the voice of God. If Ave be
praised but by few, then, " Satis unus, satis
nullus " ; we cry. These are wise, and one wise
man is worth a whole herd of the people. But

DECEITFULNESS OF THE HEART. 161

if we be praised by none at all, we resolve to
be even with all the world, and speak well of
nobody, and think well only of ourselves. And
then we have such beggarly arts, such tricks,
to cheat for praise. We inquire after our faults
and failings, only to be told Ave have none, but
did excellently ; and then we are pleased : we
rail upon our actions, only to be chidden for so
doing ; and then he is our friend who chides us
into a good opinion of ourselves, which how-
ever all the world cannot make us part with.
Nay, humihty itself makes us proud ; so false,
so base is the heart of man. For humility is
so noble a virtue that even pride itself puts on
its upper garment ; and we do like those who
cannot endure to look upon an ugly or a de-
formed person, and yet will give a great price
for a picture extremely like him. Humility is
despised in substance, but courted and admired
in effigy. And ^Esop's picture was sold for
two talents, when himself was made a slave at
the price of two philippics. And because hu-
mility makes a man to be honored, therefore
we imitate all its garbs and postures, its civili-
ties and silence, its modesties and condescen-
sions. And, to prove that we are extremely
proud in the midst of all this pageantry, we
should be extremely angry at any man that
should say we are proud ; and that is a sure
sign we are so. And in the midst of all our
11

162 FAITE AND PATIENCE.

arts to seem liumble, we use devices to bring
ourselves into talk ; we thrust ourselves into
company, we listen at doors, and, like the great
beards in Rome that pretended philosophy and
strict life, " we walk by the obelisk," and medi-
tate in piazzas, that they that meet us may
talk of us, and they that follow may cry out,
" Behold ! there goes an excellent man ! He is
very prudent, or very learned, or a charitable
person, or a good housekeeper, or at least very
humble."

When the heart of man is bound up by the
grace of God, and tied in golden bands, and
watched by angels, tended by those nurse-
keepers of the soul, it is not easy for a man to
wander ; and the evil of his heart is but like
the ferity and wildness of lions' whelps. But
when once we have broken the hedge, and got
into the strengths of youth, and the licentious-
ness of an ungoverned age, it is wonderful to
observe what a great inundation of mischief in
a very short time will overflow all the banks of
reason and rehgion.

S

FAITH AND PATIENCE.

O long as the world lived by sense and dis-
courses of natural reason, as they were

FAITH AND PATIENCE. 163

abated with human infirmities and not at all
heightened by the spirit and divine revelations,
so long men took their accounts of good and
-bad by their being prosperous or unfortunate ;
and amongst the basest and most ignorant of
men that only was accounted honest which
was profitable, and he only wise that was
rich, and those men beloved of God who
received from him all that might satisfy their
lust, their ambition, or their revenge.

But because God sent wise men into the
world, and they were treated rudely by the
world, and exercised with evil accidents, and
this seemed so great a discouragement to virtue,
that even these wise men were more troubled
to reconcile virtue and misery than to reconcile
their affections to the suffering ; God was pleased
to enlio-hten their reason with a little beam of
faith, or else heightened their reason by wiser
principles than those of vulgar understandings,
and taught them in the clear glass of faith, or
the dim perspective of philosopliy, to look be-
yond the cloud, and there to spy that there
stood glories behind their curtain, to which they
could not come but by passing through the
cloud, and being wet with the dew of heaven
and the waters of affliction. And according as
the world grew more enlightened by faith, so it
grew more dark with mourning and sorrows.
God sometimes sent a light of fire, and a pillar

164 FAITH AND PATIENCE.

of a cloud, and the brightness of an angel, and
the lustre of a star, and the sacrament of a
rainbow, to guide his people through their por-
tion of sorrows, and to lead them through
troubles to rest. But as the sun of righteous-
ness approached towards the chambers of the
east, and sent the harbingers of hght peeping
through the curtains of the night, and leading
on the day of faith and brightest revelation ;
so God sent degrees of trouble upon wise and
good men, that now in the same degree m the
which the world " lives by faith " and not by
sense, in the same degree they might be able
to live in virtue even while she lived in trouble,
and not reject so great a beauty because she
goes in mourning, and hath a black cloud of
cypress drawn before her face. Literally thus:
God first entertained their services, and allured
and prompted on the infirmities of the infant
world by temporal prosperity ; but by degrees
changed his method, and as men grew stronger
in the knowledge of God and the expectations
of heaven, so they grew weaker in their for-
tunes, more afflicted in their bodies, more
abated in their expectations, more subject to
their enemies, and were to " endure the con-
tradiction of sinners," and the immission of the
sharpnesses of providence and chvine economy.

THE HUMILIATION OF CHRIST. 165

THE HUMILIATION OF CHRIST.

JESUS entered into the world with all the
circumstances of poverty. He had a star
to illustrate his birth ; but a stable for his bed-
chamber, and a manger for his cradle. The
angels sang hymns when he was born ; but he
was cold and cried, uneasy and unprovided.
He hved long in the trade of a carpenter ; he
by whom God made the world had, in his
first years, the business of a mean and ignoble
trade. He did good wherever he went ; and
almost wherever he went was abused. He
deserved heaven for his obedience, but fovmd
a cross in his way thither: and if ever any man
had reason to expect fan- usages fi'om God, and
to be dandled in the lap of ease, softness, and a
prosperous fortune, he it was only that could
deserve that, or anything that can be good.
But after he had chosen to live a life of vir-
tue, of poverty and labor, he entered into a
state of death.

All that Christ came for was, or was mingled
with, sufferings : for all those little joys which
God sent, either to recreate his person, or to
illustrate his office, were abated or attended
with afflictions ; God being more careful to
establish in him the covenant of siifferings
than to refresh his sorrows. Presently afler

166 THE HUMILIATION OF CHRIST.

the angels had finished their hallelujahs, he
was forced to fly to save his life ; and the air
became full of shrieks of the desolate mothers
of Bethlehem for their dying babes. God had
no sooner made him illustrious with a voice
from heaven, and the descent of the Holy
Ghost upon him in the waters of baptism, but
he was delivered over to be tempted and as-
saulted by the devil in the wilderness. His
transfiguration was a bright ray of glory ; but
then also he entered into a cloud, and was told
a sad story what he was to suffer at Jerusalem.
And upon Palm-Sunday, when he rode tri-
umphantly into Jerusalem, and was adorned
with the acclamations of a king and a God, he
wet the palms with his tears, sweeter than the
drops of manna or the little pearls of heaven
that descended upon Mount Hermon ; weeping
in the midst of this triumph over obstinate,
perishing, and malicious Jerusalem. For this
Jesus was like the rainbow which God set in
the clouds as a sacrament to confirm a promise
and establish a grace ; he was half made of the
glories of the light, and half of the moisture of
a cloud ; in his best days he was but half tri-
umph and half sorrow : he was sent to tell of
his Father's mercies, and that God intended
to spare us ; but appeared not but in the com-
pany or in the retinue of a shower, and of foul
weather.

THE HUMILIATION OF CHRIST. 167

But I need not tell that Jesus, beloved of
God, was a suffering person. That which con-
cerns tills question most, is, that he made for
us a covenant of sufferings ; his doctrines were
such as expressly and by consequence enjoin and
suppose sufferings and a state of affliction ; his
very promises were sufferings ; his beatitudes
were sufferings ; his rewards, and his argu-
ments to invite men to follow him, were only
taken from sufferings m this life, and the re-
ward of sufferings hereafter. We must follow
him that was crowned with thorns and sor-
rows, — him that was drenched in Cedron,
nailed upon the cross, that deserved all good
and suffered all evil ; that is the sum of the
Christian religion, as it distinguishes from all
the relio-ions of the world. So that if we will
serve the kino- of sufferings, whose crown was
of thorns, whose sceptre was a reed of scorn,
whose imperial robe Avas a scarlet of mockery,
whose throne was the cross, we must serve
him in siifferings, in poverty of spirit, in humil-
ity and mortification. And for our reward we
shall have persecution, and all its blessed con-
sequents. '•'■ Atque lioc est esse Christianum."

For as the gospel was founded in sufferings,
we shall also see it grow in persecutions : and
as Christ's blood did cement the corner-stones
and the first foundations, so the blood and
sweat, the groans and sighings, the afflictions

168 TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY.

and mortifications of saints and martyrs did
make the superstructures, and must at last
finish the building.

TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY.

NOW began to work the greatest glory of
the divine providence : here was the case
of Christianity at stake. The world was rich
and prosperous, learned and full of wise men ;
the gospel was preached with poverty and
persecution, in simplicity of discourse, and in
demonstration of the spirit. God was on one
side, and the devil on the other ; they each
of them dressed up their city ; Babylon upon
earth, Jerusalem from above. The devil's city
was full of pleasure, triumphs, victories, and
cruelty ; good news, and great wealth ; con-
quest over kings, and making nations tribu-
tary. They " bound kings in chains, and the
nobles with links of iron ; and the inheritance
of the earth was theirs." The Romans were
lords over the greatest part of the world ; and
God permitted to the devil the firmament and
increase, the wars and the success of that people
giving to him an entire power of disposing the
great change of the world so as might best

TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY. 169

increase their greatness and power : and lie
therefore did it because all the power of the
Roman greatness was a professed enemy to
Christianity. And, on the other side, God
was to build up Jerusalem, and the kingdom
of the gospel; and he chose to build it of
hewn stone, cut and broken. The Apostles
he chose for preachers, and they had no learn-
ing ; women and mean people were the first
disciples, and they had no power. The devil
was to lose his kingdom, he wanted no malice ;
and therefore he stirred up, and, as well as he
could, he made active, all the power of Rome,
and all the learning of the Greeks, and all the
malice of barbarous people, and all the preju-
dice and the obstinacy of the Jews, against this
doctrine and institution, which preached, and
promised, and brought persecution along with
it. On the one side there was " scandalum cru-
cis,^^ on the other, '■'■ jjatientia sanctorum " ; and
what was the event ? They that had overcome
the world could not strangle Christianity. But
so have I seen the sun with a little ray of distant
light challenge all the power of darkness, and,
without Aaolence and noise climbing up the hill,
hath made night so to retire that its memorv
was lost in the joys and sprightfulness of the
morning. And Christianity, without violence
or armies, without resistance and self-preser-
vation, without strength or human eloquence,

170 TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY,

without challenging of privileges or fighting
against tyranny, without alteration of govern-
ment and scandal of princes, with its humility
and meekness, with toleration and patience,
with obedience and charity, with praying and
dying, did insensibly tvini the world into Chris-
tian, and persecution into victory.

Presently it came to pass that men were no
longer ashamed of the cross, but it was worn
upon breasts, printed in the air, drawn upon
foreheads, carried upon banners, put upon
crowns imperial. Presently it came to pass
that the religion of the despised Jesus did
infinitely prevail ; a religion that taught men
to be meek and humble, apt to i^eceive injuries,
but unapt to do any ; a religion that gave
countenance to the poor and pitiful, in a time
when riches were adored, and ambition and
pleasure had possessed the heart of all man-
kind ; a religion that would change the face of
thino:s and the hearts of men, and break vile
habits into gentleness and counsel. That such
a religion, in such a time, by the sermons and
conduct of fishermen, men of mean breeding
and illiberal ar-ts, should so speedily triumph
over the philosophy of the world, and the argu-
ments of the subtle, and the sermons of the
eloquent, the power of princes and the inter-
ests of States, the inclinations of nature and
the blindness of zeal, the force of custom and

TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY. 171

the solicitation of passions, the pleasures of sin
and the busy arts of the devil ; that is, against
wit and power, superstition and wilfulness,
fame and money, nature and empire, which are
all the causes in this world that can make a
thing impossible ; — this, this is to be ascribed
to the power of God, and is the great demon-
stration of the resurrection of Jesus. Every-
thing was an argument for it, and improved it ;
no objection could hinder it, no enemies destroy
it ; whatsoever was for them, it made the relig-
ion to increase ; whatsoever was against them,
made it to increase ; sunshine and storms, fair
weather or foul, it was all one as to the event
of things : for they were instruments in the
hands of God, who could make what himself
should choose to be the product of any cause ;
so that if the Christians had peace, they went
abroad and brought in converts ; if they had
no peace, but persecution, the converts came
in to them. In prosperity they allured and
enticed the world by the beauty of holiness; in
affliction and trouble they amazed all men with
the splendor of tlieir innocence and the glo-
ries of their patience ; and quickly it was that
the world became disciple to the glorious Naza-
rene, and men could no longer doubt of the
resurrection of Jesus, when it became so de-
monstrated by the certainty of them that saw
it, and the courage of them that died for it,

172 AFFLICTIONS OF THE CHURCH.

and the multitude of them that believed it ;
who by their sermons and their actions, by
their public offices and discourses, by festivals
and eucharists, by arguments of experience
and sense, by reason and religion, by persuad-
ing rational men and establishing believing
Christians, by their living in the obedience of
Jesus and dying for the testimony of Jesus,
have greatly advanced his kingdom, and his
power, and his glory, into which he entered
his resurrection from the dead.

AFFLICTIONS OF THE CHURCH.

TF under a head crowned with thorns, we
-*- bring to God members circled with roses,
and softness, and delicacy, triumphant mem-
bers in the militant Church, God will reject us ;
he will not know us who are so unlike our
elder brother. For we are members of the
Lamb, not of the lion ; and of Christ's suffer-
ing part, not of the triumphant part : and for
three hundred years together the Church lived
upon blood, and was nourished with blood, — the
blood of her own children. Thirty-three bish-
ops of Rome in immediate succession were put
to violent and unnatural deaths ; and so were
all the churches of the East and West built.

AFFLICTIONS OF THE CHURCH. 173

The cause of Christ and of reho-Ion was ad-
vanced by the sword, but it was the sword of
the persecutors, not of resisters or warriors.
They were all baptized into the death of
Christ ; their very profession and institution
is to live like him, and, when he requires it,
to die for him ; that is the very formality, the
life and essence, of Christianity. TJiis, I say,
lasted for three hundred years, that the pray-
ers, and the backs, and the necks of Cliristians
fought against the rods and axes of the perse-
cutors, and prevailed, till the country, and the
cities, and the court itself, was filled with
Christians. And by this time the army of
martyi's was vast and nxunerous, and the num-
ber of sufferers blunted the hano;man's sword.
For Christ had triumphed over the princes and
powers of the world, before he would admit
them to serve him ; he first felt their mahce,
before he would make use of their defence ; to
show, that it was not his necessity that required
it, but his grace that admitted kings and queens
to be nurses of the Church.

Christ also promised that " all things should
work together for the best to his servants,"
that is, he would " out of the eater bring meat,
and out of the strong issue sweetness," and
crowns and sceptres should spring from crosses,
and that the cross itself should stand upon the
globes and sceptres of princes ; but he never

174 THE RIGHTEOUS OPPRESSED.

promised to liis servants that they should pur-
sue kings and destroy armies, that they should
reign over nations, and promote the cause of
Jesus Christ by breaking his commandment.
" The shield of faith, and the sword of the
spirit, the armor of righteousness, and the
weapons of spiritual warfare " ; these are they
by which Christianity swelled from a small
company, and a less reputation, to possess the
chairs of doctors, and the thrones of princes,
and the hearts of all men.

THE RIGHTEOUS OPPRESSED.

TF prosperity were the voice of God to ap-
-*- prove an action, then no man were vicious
but he that is punished, and nothing were
rebellion but that which cannot be easily sup-
pressed ; and no man were a pirate but he that
robs with a little vessel ; and no man could be
a tyrant but that he is no prince ; and no man
an unjust invader of his neighbor's rights but
he that is beaten and overthrown. Then the
crime grows big and loud, then it calls to
heaven for vengeance, when it hath been long
a growing, when it hath thriven under the
devil's managing ; when God hath long suffered
it, and with patience, in vain expecting the

THE RIGHTEOUS OPPRESSED. 175

repentance of a sinner. He that " treasures
up wrath against the day of wrath," that man
hath been a prosperous, that is, an unpunished
and a thriving sinner : but then it is the sin
that thrives, not the man : and that is the mis-
take upon this whole question ; for t])e sin can-
not thrive, unless the man goes on without ap-
parent punishment and restraint. And all that
the man gets b} it is, that by a continual course
of sin he is prepared for an intolerable ruin.

The spirit of God bids us look upon the end
of these men ; not the way they walk, or the
instrument of that pompous death. When
Epaminondas was asked which of the three
was happiest, himself, Chabrias, or Iphicrates,
he bid the man stay till they were all dead ;
for till then that question could not be an-
swered. He that had seen the Vandals besiege
the city of Hippo, and had known the barbar-
ousness of that michristened people, and had
observed that St. Austin with all his prayers
and vows could not obtain peace in his own
days, not so much as a reprieve for the perse-
cution, and then had observed St. Austin die
with grief that very night, would have per-
ceived his calamity more visible than the re-
w'ard of his piety and holy religion. AVhen
Lewis, surnamed Pius, went his voyage to
Palestine upon a holy end, and for the glory
of God, to fight against the Saracens and Turks

176 THE RIGHTEOUS OPPRESSED.

and Mamelukes, the world did promise to
themselves that a good cause should thrive in
the hands of so holy a man ; but the event
was far otherwise : his brother Robert was
killed, and his army destroyed, and himself
taken prisoner, and the money which by his
mother was sent for his redemption was cast
away in a storm, and he was exchanged for the
last town the Christians had in Eg^-pt, and
brought home the cross of Christ upon his
shoulder in a real pressure and participation of
his Master's sufferings. When Charles the
Fifth went to Algiers to suppress pirates and
unchristened villains, the cause was more con-
fident than the event was prosperous ; and
when he was almost ruined in a prodigious
storm, he told the minutes of the clock, ex-
pecting that at midnight, when religious per-
sons rose to matins, he should be eased by the
benefit of their prayers. But the providence
of God trod upon those waters, and left no foot-
steps for discovery. His navy was beat in
pieces, and his design ended in dishonor, and
his life almost lost by the bargain. Was ever
cause more bafiled than the Christian cause by
the Turks in all Asia and Africa, and some
parts of Europe, if to be persecuted and af-
flicted be reckoned a calamity ? What prince
was ever more unfortunate than Henry the
Sixth of England ? and yet that age saw none

THE RIGHTEOUS OPPRESSED. 177

more pious and devout. And the title of the
house of Lancaster was advanced against the
right of York for three descents. But what
was the end of these things ? The persecuted
men were made saints, and their memories are
preserved in honor, and their souls shall reign
forever. And some good men were engaged
in a wrong cause, and the good cause was
sometimes managed by evil men ; till that the
suppressed cause was hffced up by God in the
hands of a young and prosperous prince, and
at last both interests were satisfied in the con-
junction of two roses, which was brought to
issue by a wonderful chain of causes managed
by the divine providence. And there is no
age, no history, no state, no great change in
the world, but hath ministered an example of
an af&icted truth, and a prevailing sin: for I
will never more call that sinner prosperous,
who, after he hath been permitted to finish his
business, shall die and perish miserably ; for at
the same rate we may envy the happiness of a
poor fisherman, who, while his nets were dry-
ing, slept upon the rock, and dreamt that he
was made a king ; on a sudden starts up, and
leaping for joy, falls down from the rock, and
in the place of his imaginary felicities loses his
little portion of pleasure and innocent solaces
he had from the sound sleep and little cares of
his humble cottage.
12

178 REAL AND APPARENT HAPPINESS.

REAL AND APPARENT HAPPINESS.

IF we should look under the skirt of the pros-
perous and prevailing tyrant, we should find
even in the days of his joys such allays and
abatements of his pleasm'e as may serve to
represent him presently miserable, besides his
final infelicities. For I have seen a young and
healthful person warm and ruddy under a poor
and thin garment, when at the same time an
old rich person hath been cold and paralytic
under a load of sables and the skins of foxes.
It is the body that makes the clothes warm,
not the clothes the body ; and the spirit of a
man makes fehcity and content, not any spoils
of a rich fortvme wrapt about a sickly and an
uneasy soul. ApoUodorus M^as a traitor and a
tyrant, and the world wondered to see a bad
man have so good a fortune ; but knew not that
he nourished scorpions in his breast, and that
his liver and his heart were eaten up with spec-
tres and images of death. His thoughts were
full of interruptions, his dreams of illusions ; his
fancy was abused with real troubles and fan-
tastic images, imagining that he saw the Scyth-
ians flaying him alive, his daughters hke
pillars of fire dancing round about a caldron in
which himself was boiling, and that his heart
accused itself to be the cause of all these evils.

REAL AND APPARENT HAPPINESS. 179

Does not he drink more sweetly that takes
his beverage in an earthen vessel, than he that
looks and searches into his golden chalices for
fear of poison, and looks pale at every sudden
noise, and sleeps in armor, and trusts nobody,
and does not trust God for his safety, but does
greater wickedness only to escape awhile un-
pimished for his former crimes ? " Auro hibi-
tur venerium.''^ No man goes about to poison a
poor man's j)itcher, nor lays plots to foi'age his
little garden made for the hospital of two bee-
hives, and the feasting of a few Pythagorean
herb-eaters. They that admire the happiness
of a prosperous, prevailing tyrant, know not
the fehcities that dwell in innocent hearts, and
poor cottages, and small fortunes.

Can a man bind a thought with chains, or
carry imaginations in the palm of his hand ?
Can the beauty of the peacock's train, or the
ostrich plume, be delicious to the palate and
the throat ? Does the hand intermeddle with
the joys of the heart ? or darkness, that hides
the naked, make him warm ? Does the body
live, as does the spirit ? or can the body of
Christ be like to common food ? Indeed the
sun shines upon the good and bad ; and the
vines give wine to the drunkard as well as to
the sober man ; pirates have fair winds and a
calm sea at the same time when the jxist and
peaceful merchantman hath them. But al-

180 MARTYRDOM.

tliouffh the things of this world are common to
good and bad, yet sacraments and spiritual joys,
the food of the soul, and the blessing of Christ,
are the pecuhar right of saints.

MARTYRDOM.

THEY that suffer anything for Christ, and
are ready to die for him, let them do
nothing against him. For certainly they think
too highly of martyi'dom, who believe it able to
excuse all the evils of a wicked life. A man
may give his body to be bm-ned, and yet have
no charity ; and he that dies without charity
dies without God: "for God is love." And
when those who fought in the days of the Mac-
cabees for the defence of true religion, and
were killed in those holy wars, yet, being dead,
were found having about their necks pendants
consecrated to idols of the Jamnenses ; it much
allayed the hope which, by their dying in so
good a cause, was entertained concerning their
beatifical resurrection. He that overcomes his
fear of death, does well ; but if he hath not also
overcome his lust, or his anger, his baptism of
blood will not wash him clean. Many things
make a man wilhng to die in a good cause :
public reputation, hope of reward, gallantry of

MARTYRDOM. 181

spii-it, a confident resolution, and a masculine
courage ; or a man may be vexed into a stub-
born and unrelenting suffering. But nothing
can make a man live well but the grace and
the love of God. But those persons are infi-
nitely condemned by their last act, who profess
theii* religion to be worth djmg for, and yet
are so unworthy as not to Hve according to its
institution. It were a rare felicity, if every
good cause could be managed by good men
only ; but we have found that evil men have
spoiled a good cause, but never that a good
cause made those evil men good and holy. If
the governor of Samaria had crucified Simon
Magus for receivuig Christian baptism, he had
no more died a martyr than he lived a saint.
For dying is not enough, and dying in a good
cause is not enough ; but then only we receive
the crown of martyrdom when our death is
the seal of our life, and our life is a continual
testimony of our dvity, and both give testimony
to the excellencies of the religion, and glorify
the grace of God. If a man be gold, the fire
purges him ; but it burns him if he be like
stubble, cheap, light, and useless. For mar-
tyrdom is the consummation of love. But then
it must be supposed that this grace must have
had its beginning, and its several stages and
periods, and must have passed through labor to
zeal, through all the regions of duty to the per-

182 MARTYRDOM.

fections of sufferings. And therefore it is a sad
thing to observe how some empty souls will
please themselves with being of such a religion
or such a cause, and, though they dishonor
their religion, or weigh down the cause with
the prejudice of sin, beheve all is swallowed up
by one honorable name, or the appellative of
one virtue. If God had forbid nothing but
heresy and treason, then to have been a loyal
man, or of a good belief, had been enough:
but he that forbade rebellion forbids all swear-
ing and covetousness, rapine and oppression,
lying and cruelty. And it is a sad thing to
see a man not only to spend his time, and his
wealth, and his money, and his friends upon his
lust, but to spend his sufferings too : to let the
canker-worm of a deadly sin devour his mar-
tyrdom. He therefore that suffers in a good
cause, let him be sure to walk worthy of that
honor to which God hath called him ; let him
first deny his sins, and then deny himself, and
then he may take up his cross and follow
Christ ; ever remembering that no man pleases
God in his death who hath walked perversely
in his life.

THE PROGRESS OE SOULS. 183

THE PROGRESS OF SOULS.

A S the silk-worm eateth itself out of a seed
^-*^ to become a little worm; and there feed-
ing on the leaves of mulberries, it grows till its
coat be off, and then works itself into a house
of silk ; then casting its pearly seeds for the
young to breed, it leaveth its silk for man, and
dieth all white and winged in the shape of a
flying creature : so is the progress of souls.
When they are regenerate by baptism, and
have cast off their first stains and the skin
of worldly vanities by feeding on the leaves
of scriptures, and the fruits of the vine, and
the joys of the sacrament, they encircle them-
selves in the rich garments of holy and virtu-
ous habits ; then by leaving their blood, which
is the Church's seed, to raise up a new gen-
eration to God, they leave a blessed memory
and fair example, and are themselves turned
into angels, whose fehcity is to do the will of
God, as theu- employment was in this world to
suffer it.

184 THE INEXPERIENCED CHRISTIAN.

THE INEXPERIENCED CHRISTIAN.

T^HE righteous is safe ; but by intermedial
-^ difficulties : and he is safe in the midst of
his persecutions ; they may disturb his rest, and
discompose his fancy, but they are like the
fierv chariot to Elias ; he is encircled with fire,
and rare circumstances, and strange usages, but
is carried up to heaven in a robe of flames.
And so was Noah safe when the flood came,
and was the great type and instance too of the
verification of this proposition ; he was put into
a strange condition, perpetually wandering,
shut up in a prison of wood, hving upon faith,
having never had the experience of being safe
in floods.

And so have I often seen young and unskil-
ful persons sitting in a little boat, w^hen every
little wave sporting aboxit the sides of the ves-
sel, and every motion and dancing of the barge
seemed a danger, and made them cling fast
upon their fellows ; and yet all the while they
were as safe as if they sat under a tree, while
a gentle wind shaked the leaves into a refresh-
ment and a cooling shade. And the unskilful,
inexperienced Christian shrieks out whenever
his vessel shakes, thinking it always a danger
that the watery pavement is not stable and resi-
dent like a rock ; and yet all his danger is m

THE SORROWS OF THE GODLY. 185

himself, none at all fi-om without : for he is
indeed moving upon the waters, but fastened
to a rock. Faith is his foundation, and hope
is his anchor, and death is his harbor, and
Christ is his pilot, and heaven is his country ;
and all the evils of poverty, or affii'onts of tri-
bunals and evil judges, of fears and sadder ap-
prehensions, are but like the loud wind blowing
from the right point : they make a noise, and
drive faster to the harbor. And if we do not
leave the ship and leap into the sea ; quit the
interests of religion, and run to the securities
of the world ; cut our cables, and chssolve our
hopes ; grow impatient, and hug a wave, and
die in its embraces ; we are as safe at sea, safer
in the storm which God sends us, than in a
calm when we are befriended with the world.

THE SORROWS OF THE GODLY.

O O much as moments are exceeded by eter-
^ nity, and the sighing of a man by the joys
of an angel, and a salutary frown by the light
of God's countenance, a few groans by the
infinite and eternal hallelujahs ; so much are
the sorrows of the godly to be undervalued in
respect of what is deposited for them in the
treasures of eternity. Their sorrows can die,

186 THE GOODNESS OF GOD.

but SO cannot their joys. And if the blessed
martyrs and confessors were asked concerning
their past sufferings and their present rest, and
the joys of their certain expectation, you should
hear them glory in nothing but in the mercies
of God, and in the cross of the Lord Jesus.
Every chain is a ray of light, and every prison
is a palace, and every loss is the purchase of a
kingdom, and every affront in the cause of God
is an eternal honor, and every day of sorrow is
a thousand years of comfort, multiplied with a
never-ceasing numeration ; days without night,
joys without sorrow, sanctity without sin,
charity without stain, possession without fear,
society without envying, communication of
joys without lessening : and they shall dwell
in a blessed country, where an enemy never
entered, and from whence a friend never went
away.

THE GOODNESS OF GOD.

17R0M the beginning of time till now, all
-*- effluxes which have come from God have
been nothing but emanations of his goodness
clothed in variety of circumstances. He made
man with no other design than that man should
be happy, and by receiving derivations fi'oni

THE GOODNESS OF GOD. 187

Ms fountain of mercy, might reflect glory to
him. And therefore God making man for his
own glory, made also a paradise for man's use ;
and did him good, to invite him to do himself a
greater. For God gave forth demonstrations
of his power by mstances of mercy, and he
who might have made ten thousand w^orlds of
wonder and prodigy, and created man with
faculties able only to stare upon and admire
those miracles of mightiness, did choose to
instance his power in the efiiisions of mercy,
that at the same instant he might represent
himself desirable and adorable, in all the capac-
ities of amiability ; viz : as excellent in himself,
and profitable to us. For as the sun sends
forth a benign and gentle influence on the seed
of plants, that it may invite forth the active
and plastic power from its recess and secrecy,
that by rising into the tallness and dimensions
of a tree it may still receive a greater and more
refreshing mfluence from its foster-father, the
prince of all the bodies of light ; and in all
these emanations the sun itself receives no ad-
vantage but the honor of doing benefits : so
doth the Almighty Father of all the creatures ;
he at first sends forth his blessings upon us,
that we by using them aright should make
ourselves capable of greater ; while the giving
glory to God, and doing homage to him, are
nothing for his advantage, but only for ours ;

188 THE GOODNESS OF GOD.

our duties towards liim being like vapors as-
cending from the eartli, not at all to refresh
the region of the clouds, but to return back in
a fi'uitfril and reft-eshing shower ; and God cre-
ated us, not that we can increase his felicity,
but that he might have a subject receptive of
felicity from him.

What a prodigy of favor is it to us, that he
hath passed by so many forms of his creatures,
and hath not set us down in the rank of any of
them, till we came to be "pawfo minor es an-
gelis^^' a little lower than the angels ? and yet
from the meanest of them God can perfect his
own praise. The deeps and the snows, the
hail and the rain, the birds of the air and the
fishes of the sea, they can and do glorify God,
and give him praise in their capacity. And yet
he gave them no speech, no reason, no immor-
tal spirit, or capacity of eternal blessedness.
But he hath distinguished us from them by the
absolute issues of his predestination, and hath
given us a lasting and eternal spirit, excellent
organs of perception, and wonderftil instru-
ments of expression, that we may join in con-
sort with the morning-star, and bear a part in
the chorus with the angels of light, to sing
hallelujah to the great Father of men and
ano-els.

The poorest person amongst us, besides the
blessings and graces already reckoned, hath

THE DANGER OF PROSPERITY. 189

enough about liim, and the accidents of every-
day, to shame him mto repentance. Does not
God send his angels to keep thee in all thy
way ? Are not they ministering spirits sent
forth to wait upon thee as thy guard ? Art not
thou kept from drowning, from fi-acture of
bones, fi'om madness, from deformities, by the
riches of the divine goodness ? Tell the joints
of thy body, dost thou want a finger ? and if
thou dost not rmderstand how great a blessing
that is, do but remember how ill thou canst
spare the use of it when thou hast but a thorn
in it. The very privative blessings, the bless-
ings of immunity, safeguard, and integrity,
which we all enjoy, deserve a thanksgiving of
a whole life. If God should send a cancer
upon thy face, or a wolf into thy breast, if he
should spread a crust of leprosy upon thy skin,
what wouldest thou give to be but as now thou
art ? Wouldest not thou repent of thy sins
upon that condition ? Which is the greater
blessing, — to be kept ft'om them, or to be
cured of them ?

I

THE DANGER OF PROSPERITY.

N the tomb of Terentia certain lamps burned
under-groimd many ages together ; but as

190 MERCY AND JUDGMENT.

soon as ever thev were brought into the air,
and saw a bigger hght, they went out, never to
be reenkindled. So long as we are in the re-
tirements of sorrow, of want, of fear, of sick-
ness, or of any sad accident, we are " burning
and shining lamps " ; but when God comes
with his forbearance, and lifts us up from the
gates of death, and carries us abroad into the
open air, that we converse with prosperity and
temptation, we go out in darkness ; and we
cannot be preserved in heat and light but by
still dwellmg in the regions of sorrow.

MERCY AND JUDGMENT.

TF God suffers men to go on in sins, and
^ punishes them not, it is not a mercy, it is
not a forbearance ; it is a hardening them, a
consigning them to ruin and reprobation : and
themselves give the best argument to prove it ;
for they continue in their sin, they multiply
their iniquity, and every day grow more an
enemy to God ; and that is no mercy that in-
creases their hostility and enmity with God.
A prosperous iniquity is the most unprosperous
condition in the whole world. " When he slew
them, they sought him, and turned them early,
and inquired after God " : but as long as they

MERCY AND JUDGMENT. 191

prevailed upon their enemies, " they foroot
that God was their strength, and the high God
was their redeemer." It was well observed
by the Persian ambassador of old, — when he
was telling the king a sad story of the over-
throw of all his army by the Athenians, he
adds this of his own, — that the day before the
fight, the young Persian gallants, being confi-
dent they should destroy their enemies, were
drinking drunk, and railing at the timorousness
and fears of rehgion, and against all their gods,
saying there were no such things, and that all
things came by chance and industry, nothing
by the providence of the Supreme Power.
But the next day, when they had fought un-
prosperously, and flying from their enemies,
who were eager in their pursuit, they came to
the river Stiymon, which was so frozen that
their boats could not laimch, and yet it began
to thaw, so that they feared the ice would not
bear them ; then you should see the bold gal-
lants, that the day before said there was no
God, most timorously and superstitiously fall
upon their faces, and beg of God that the
river Strymon might bear them over from their
enemies.

What wisdom and philosophy, and perpetual
experience and revelation, and promises and
blessings cannot do, a mighty fear can ; it can
allay the confidences of bold lust and imperious

192 MERCY AND JUDGMENT.

sin, and soften our spirit into the lowness of a
child, our revenge into the charity of prayers,
our impudence into the blushings of a chidden
girl; and therefore God hath taken a course
proportionable : for he is not so unmercifully
merciful as to give milk to an infirm lust, and
hatch the egg to the bigness of a cockatrice.
And therefore observe how it is that God's
mercy prevails over all his works. It is even
then when nothing can be discerned but his
judgments. For as when a famine had been
in Israel in the days of Ahab for three years
and a half, when the angry prophet Elijah met
the king, and presently a great wind arose, and
the dust blew into the eyes of them that walked
abroad, and the face of the heavens was black
and all tempest, yet then the prophet was the
most gentle, and God began to forgive, and
the heavens were more beautiful than when the
sun puts on the brightest ornaments of a bride-
groom, going from his chambers of the east:
so it is in the economy of the divine mercy ;
when God makes our faces black, and the
\%ands blow so loud till the cordage cracks,
and our gay fortunes spHt, and our houses
are dressed with cypress and yew, and the
mourners go about the streets, this is nothing
but the '■'■ pompa misericordice,^^ — this is the
funeral of our sins, dressed indeed with em-
blems of mournmg, and proclaimed with sad

MERCY AND JUDGMENT. 193

accents of death ; but the sight is refreshing
as the beauties of the field which God had
blessed, and the somids are healthfiil as the
noise of a physician.

But however we sleep in the midst of such
alanns, yet know that there is not one death in
all the neighborhood but is intended to thee ;
every crowing of the cock is to awake thee to
repentance. And if thou sleepest still, the next
turn may be thine ; God will send his angel, as
he did to Peter, and smite thee on thy. side,
and awake thee from thy dead sleep of sin
and sottishness. But beyond this some are
despisers still, and hope to drown the noises
of Momit Sinai, the sound of cannons, of thmi-
ders and lightnings, with a counter-noise of
revelling and clamorous roarings, with merry
meetmgs ; hke the sacrifices to Moloch, they
sound drums and trumpets that they might not
hear the sad shriekings of their children as they
were dying in the cavity of the brazen idol.
And when their conscience shrieks out or mur-
murs in a sad melancholy, or somethmg that is
dear to them is smitten, they attempt to drown
it in a sea of drink, in the heathenish noises of
idle and drunken company ; and that which
God sends to lead them to repentance leads
them to a tavern, not to refresh their needs of
nature, or for ends of a tolerable civility, or in-
nocent purposes, but, like the condemned per-
is

194 PRIMITIVE PIETY.

sons among the Levantines, they tasted wine
freely that they might die and be insensible.

He that is fnll of stripes and troubles, and
decked round about with thorns, he is near to
God. Bvit he that, because he sits uneasily
when he sits near the King that was crowned
with thorns, shall remove thence, or strew
flowers, roses and jessamine, the down of this-
tles and the softest gossamer, that he may die
without pain, die quietly and like a lamb, sink
to the bottom of hell without noise ; this man
is a fool, because he accepts death if it arrests
him in civil language, is content to die by the
sentence of an eloquent judge, and prefers a
quiet passage to hell before going to heaven
in a storm.

PRIMITIVE PIETY.

T7t7HEN Christianity, like the day-spring from
* * the east, with a new light did not only
enlighten the world, but amazed the minds
of men, and entertained their curiosities, and
seized upon their warmer and more pregnant
affections, it was no wonder that whole nations
were converted at a sermon, and multitudes
were instantly professed, and their understand-
ings followed then- affections, and their wills

PRIMITIVE PIETY. 195

followed tlieir understandings, and they were
convinced by miracle, and overcome by grace,
and passionate with zeal, and wisely governed
by their guides, and ravished with the sanctity
of the doctrine and the holiness of their exam-
ples. And this was not only their duty, but
a great instance of providence, that by the
great rehgion and piety of the first professors,
Christianity might be finnly planted, and un-
shaken by scandal, and hardened by persecu-
tion; and that these first lights might be ac-
tual precedents forever, and copies for us to
transcribe in all descending ages of Christian-
itv, that thither we midit run to fetch oU to
enkindle our extinguished lamps.

Men of old looked upon themselves as they
stood by the examples and precedents of mar-
tyrs, and compared their piety to the life of St.
Paul, and estimated their zeal by flames of the
Boanerges, St. James and his brother ; and
the bishops were thought reprovable as they
fell short of the ordinary government of St.
Peter and St. John ; and the assemblies of
Christians were so holy that every meeting had
religion enough to hallow a house and convert
it to a church ; and every day of feasting was
a communion ; and every fasting-day was a
day of repentance and alms ; and every day
of thanksgiving was a day of joy and alms ;
and religion began all their actions, and prayer

196 GROWTH IN GRACE.

consecrated them ; and they ended in charity
and were not polluted with design : they de-
spised the world heartily and pursued after
heaven greedily ; they knew no ends but to
serve God and to be saved ; and had no de-
signs upon their neighbors but to lead them
to God and to felicity.

GROWTH IN GRACE.

A MAN cannot, after a state of sin, be in-
■^-^ stantly a saint ; the work of heaven is not
done by a flash of lightnmg, or a dash of affec-
tionate rain, or a few tears of a relenting pity.
Remember that God sent you into the world
for religion : we are but to pass through our
pleasant fields or our hard labors, but to lodge
a little while in our fair palaces or our meaner
cottages, but to bait in the way at our full
tables or with our spare diet; but then only
man does his proper employment when he
prays, and does charity, and mortifies his im-
ruly appetites, and restrains his violent pas-
sions, and becomes like to God, and imitates
his holy Son, and writes after the copies of
apostles and saints.

The canes of Egypt, when they newly arise
from their bed of mud and slime of Nilus, start

GROWTH IN GRACE. 197

up into an equal and continual length, and are
interi'upted but Avith few knots, and are strong
and beauteous with great distances and inter-
vals : but when they are grown to their full
length, they lessen into the point of a pyramid,
and multiply their knots and joints, interrupt-
ing the fineness and smoothness of its body.
So are the steps and declensions of him that
does not grow in grace. At first, when he
springs up from his impimty by the waters
of baptism and repentance, he grows straight
and strong, and suffers but few interruptions
of piety ; and his constant courses of rehgion
are but rarely intermitted, till they ascend up
to a full age, or towards the ends of their life ;
then they are weak, and their devotions often
inteiTnitted, and their breaches are frequent,
and they seek excuses and labor for dispen-
sations, and love God and rehgion less and
less, till their old age, instead of a crown of
their virtue and perseverance, ends in levity
and unprofitable courses ; light and useless as
the tufted feathers upon the cane, every wind
can play with it and abuse it, but no man can
make it useful. When, therefore, our piety
interrupts its greater and more solemn ex-
pressions, and upon the return of the greater
offices and biffffer solemnities we find them
to come iipon our spirits like the wave of a
tide, w^iich retired only because it was natural

198 GROWTH IN GRACE.

SO to do, and yet came farther upon the strand
at the next roUing; when every new confes-
sion, every succeedmg communion, every time
of separation for more solemn and intense
prayer is better spent and more affectionate,
leaving a greater relish upon the spirit, and
possessing greater portions of our aflPections,
our reason and our choice ; then we may
give God thanks, who hath given us more
grace to use that grace, and a blessing to en-
deavor our duty, and a blessing upon our en-
deavor.

In all cases, the well-grown Christian, he
that improves or goes forward in his way to
heaven, brings virtue forth, not into discourses
and panegyrics, but into his life and manners.
His virtue, although it serves many good ends
accidentally, yet, by his intention, it only sup-
presses his inordinate passions, makes him tem-
perate and chaste, casts out his devils of drunk-
enness and lust, pride and rage, malice and re-
venge ; it makes him useful to his brother, and
a servant of God. And although these flowers
cannot choose but please his eye and delight
his smell, yet he chooses to gather honey, and
lick up the dew of heaven, and feasts his spirit
upon the manna, and dwells not in the collat-
eral usages and accidental sweetnesses which
dwell at the gates of other senses ; but, like
a bee, loads his thighs with wax and his bag

GROWTH IN SIN. 199

with honey, that is, with the useful parts of
virtue, in order to hohness and felicity.

Though the great physician of our souls hath
mingled profits and pleasures with virtue, to
make its chalice sweet and apt to be drank off;
yet he that takes out the sweet ingredient and
feasts his palate with the less wholesome part
because it is delicious, serves a low end of
sense or interest, but serves not God at all,
and as little does benefit to his soul. Such
a person is like Homer's bu-d, deplumes him-
self to feather all the naked callows that he
sees ; and holds a taper that may light others
to heaven, while he burns his own fingers. But
a well-grown person, out of habit and choice,
out of love and -sartue and just intention, goes
on his journey in straight ways to heaven, even
when the bridle and coercion of laws, or the
spurs of interest or reputation are laid aside ;
and desires witnesses of his actions, not that he
may advance his fame, but for reverence and
fear, and to make it still more necessary to do
holy things.

GROWTH IN SIN.

WHEN" we see a child strike a servant
rudely, or jeer a silly person, or wittingly

200 GROWTH IN SIN.

cheat his playfellow, or talk words light as the
skirt of a summer garment, we laugh and are
deliffhted with the wit and confidence of the
boy, and encourage such hopefal beginnings ;
and in the mean time we consider not that from
these beginnings he shall grow up till he be-
come a tyrant, an oppressor, a goat, and a
traitor. No man is discerned to be vicious
so soon as he is so ; and vices have their
infancy and their childhood ; and it cannot
be expected that in a child's age should be
the vice of a man ; that were monstrous, as
if he wore a beard in his cradle ; and we do
not believe that a serpent's sting does just
then grow when he strikes us in a vital part ;
the venom and the little spear was there when
it first began to creep from his little shell.

For so have I seen the little purls of a spring
sweat through the bottom of a bank and inten-
erate the stubborn pavement, till it hath made
it fit for the impression of a child's foot ; and it
was despised, like the descending pearls of a
misty morning, till it had opened its way and
made a stream large enough to carry away the
ruins of the undermined strand, and to invade
the neighboring gardens : but then the despised
drops were grown into an artificial river and an
intolerable mischief. So are the first entrances
of sin stopped with the antidotes of a hearty
prayer, and checked into sobriety by the eye

GROWTH IN SIN. 201

of a reverend man, or tlie counsels of a single
sermon : but when such beginnino-s are nes:-
lected, and our religion hath not in it so
much philosophy as to think anything evil as
long as we can endure it, they grow up to
ulcers and pestilential evils ; they destroy the
soul by then' abode, who at their first entry
might have been killed with the pressure of
a httle finger.

I wish we hved in an age in which the
people were to be treated with concerning re-
nouncing the single actions of sin, and the sel-
dom interruptions of piety. Certain it is, that
God hath given us precepts of such a holiness
and such a purity, such a meekness and such
humility, as hath no pattern but Christ, no prec-
edent but the pui'ities of God : and therefore it
is intended we should live with a life whose
actions are not checkered with white and black,
half sin and half virtue. God's sheep are not
like Jacob's flock, streaked and spotted ; it is
an entire holiness that God requires, and will
not endure to have a holy course interrupted
by the dishonor of a base and ignoble action.
I do not mean that a man's life can be as pure
as the sun, or the rays of celestial eJerusalem;
but like the moon, in which there are spots,
but they are no deformity ; a lessening only
and an abatement of light, no cloud to hinder
and draw a veil before its face, but sometimes

202 GROWTH IN SIN.

it is not so serene and bright as at other
times.

Every man hath his indiscretions and infir-
mities, his arrests and sudden incursions, his
neighborhoods and semblances of sin, his Httle
violences to reason, and peevish melancholy,
and humorous fantastic discourses, unaptness
to a devout prayer, his fondness to judge fa-
vorable in his own cases, little deceptions, and
voluntary and involuntary cozenages, ignoran-
ces and inadvertencies, careless hours and un-
watchful seasons. But no good man can ever
commit one act of adultery ; no godly man will,
at any time, be drunk ; or if he be, he ceases
to be a godly man, and is run into the confines
of death, and is sick at heart, and may die of
the sickness, die eternally. This happens more
frequently in persons of an infant piety, when
the virtue is not corroborated by a long abode,
and a confinned resolution, and an usual vic-
tory, and a triumphant grace : and the longer
we are accustomed to piety, the more unfre-
quent will be the little breaches of folly, and a
returning to sin. But as the needle of a com-
pass, when it is directed to its beloved star, at
the first addresses waves on either side, and
seems indiflFerent in his courtship of the rising
or declining stm, and when it seems first deter-
mined to the north, stands awhile trembling, as
if it suffered inconvenience in the first fruition

GROWTH IN SIN. 203

of its desires, and stands not still in full enjoy-
ment till after first a great variety of motion,
and then in an undistui'bed posture : so is
the piety and so is the conversion of a man
wrought by degrees and several steps of imper-
fection : and at first our choices are wavering,
convinced by the grace of God, and yet not per-
suaded ; and then persuaded, but not resolved ;
and then resolved, but deferring to begin ; and
then beginning, but (as all beginnings are) in
weakness and uncertainty ; and we fly out
often into huge indiscretions and look back
to Sodom, and long to return to Eg\iDt : and
when the storm is quite over, we find little bub-
blings and unevennesses upon the face of the
waters, — we often weaken our own purposes
by the returns of sin ; and we do not call our-
selves conquerors, till by the long possession of
virtues it is a strange and miusual, and therefore
an uneasy and unpleasant tiling, to act a crime.

He that hath passed many stages of a good
life, to prevent his being tempted to a single
sin, must be very careful that he never enter-
tain his spirit with the remembrances of his past
sin, nor amuse it with the fantastic apprehen-
sions of the present. When the Israelites fan-
cied the sapidness and relish of the fleshpots,
they longed to taste and to return.

So when a Lvbian tio-er, drawn from his
wilder foragings, is shut up and taught to eat

204 GROWTH IN SIN.

civil meat, and suffer the authority of a man,
he sits down tamely in his prison, and pays to
his keeper fear and reverence for his meat.
But if he cliance to come again and taste a
draught of warm blood, he presently leaps into
his natural cruelty. He scarce abstains from
eating those hands that brought him discipline
and food. So is the nature of a man made
tame and gentle by the grace of God, and re-
duced to reason, and kept in awe by religion
and laAvs, and by an awftil virtue is taught to
forget those alluring and sottish relishes of sin.
But if he diverts from his path, and snatches
handfuls from the wanton vineyards, and re-
members the lasciviousness of his unwholesome
food that pleased his childish palate, then he
grows sick again and hungry after unwhole-
some diet, and longs for the apples of Sodom.
A man must walk through the world without
eyes or ears, fancy or appetite, but such as are
created and sanctified by the grace of God ;
and being once made a new man, he must
serve all the needs of nature by the appetites
and faculties of grace ; nature must be wholly
a servant: and we must so look towards the
deliciousness of our religion and the ravish-
ments of heaven, that our memory must be
forever useless to the affairs and perceptions
of sin. We cannot stand, we cannot live,
unless we be curious and watchful in this par-
ticular.

WORLDLY POSSESSIONS. 205

Every delay of return is, in the case of
habitual sins, an approach to desperation, be-
cause the nature of habits is hke that of the
crocodiles, they grow as long as they Hve ; and
if they come to obstinacy or confirmation, they
are in hell already, and can never return back.
For so the Pannonian bears, when thev have
clasped a dart in the region of their liver,
wheel themselves upon the wound, and with
anger and maUcious revenge strike the deadly
barb deeper, and cannot be quit from that fatal
steel, but, in flying, bear along that which them-
selves make the instrument of a more hasty
death. So is every vicious person struck with
a deadly wound, and his own hands force it
into the entertainments of the heart ; and be-
cause it is painful to draw it forth by a sharp
and salutary repentance, he still rolls and turns
upon his woimd, and carries his death in his
bowels, where it first entered by choice, and
then dwelt by love, and at last shall finish the
tragedy by divine judgments and an unalterable
decree.

WORLDLY POSSESSIONS.

SUPPOSE a man gets all the world, what
^ is it that he gets? It is a bubble and a
phantasm, and hath no reality beyond a pres-

206 WORLDLY POSSESSIONS.

ent transient use ; a thing that is impossible to
be enjoyed, because its fruits and usages are
transmitted to us by parts and by succession.
He that hath all the world, (if we can suppose
such a man,) cannot have a dish of fresh sum-
mer fruits in the midst of winter, not so much
as a green fig : and very much of its possessions
is so hid, so fugacious and of so uncertain pur-
chase, that it is like the riches of the sea to the
lord of the shore ; all the fish and wealth within
all its hollownesses are his, but he is never the
better for what he cannot get. All the shell-
fish that produce pearl, produce them not for
him ; and the bowels of the earth shall hide
her treasures in undiscovered retirements. So
that it will signify as much to this great pvxr-
chaser to be entitled to an inheritance in the
upper region of the air ; he is so far from pos-
sessino; all its riches, that he does not so much
as know of them, nor understand the philosophy
of her minerals.

I consider, that he that is the greatest pos-
sessor in the world, enjoys its best and most
noble parts, and those which are of most excel-
lent perfection, but in common with the inferior
persons and the most despicable of his king-
dom. Can the greatest prince enclose the
sun and set one httle star in his cabinet for
his own use ? Or secure to himself the gentle
and benign influences of any one constellation ?

WORLDLY POSSESSIONS. 207

Are not his subjects' fields bedewed with the
same showers that water his gardens of pleas-
ure? /

Nay, those things which he esteems his orna-
ment and the singularity of his possessions, are
they not of more use to others than to himself?
For suppose his garments splendid and shining
like the robe of a cherub or the clothing of the
fields, all that he that wears them enjoys, is,
that they keep him warm and clean and mod-
est ; and all this is done by clean and less pom-
pous vestments ; and the beauty of them, which
distinguishes him from others, is made to please
the eyes of the beholders ; and he is like a fair
bird, or the meretricious painting of a wanton
woman, made wholly to be looked on, that is,
to be enjoyed by every one but himself. And
the fairest face and the sparkling eye cannot
perceive or enjoy their own beauties, but by
reflection. It is I that am pleased with behold-
ing his gayety, and the gay man in his greatest
bravery is only pleased because I am pleased
with the sight ; so borrowing his little and im-
aginary complacency from the delight that I
have, not from any inherency of his own pos-
session.

The poorest artisan of Rome, walking in
Caesar's gardens, had the same pleasures which
they ministered to their lord. And although
it may be he was put to gather fruits to eat

208 WORLDLY POSSESSIONS.

from another place, yet his other senses were
dehghted equally with Caesar's. The birds
made him as good music, the flowers gave him
as sweet smells, he there sucked as good air,
and delighted in the beauty and order of the
place, for the same reason and upon the same
perception as the prince himself; save only
that Cffisar paid for all that pleasure vast sums
of money, the blood and treasure of a province,
which the poor man had for nothing.

Suppose a man lord of all the world, (for
still we are but in supposition,) yet since every-
thino; is received not according to its own
greatness and worth, but according to the ca-
pacity of the receiver, it signifies very little as
to our content, or to the riches of our posses-
sion. If any man should give to a lion a fair
meadow full of hay, or a thousand quince-
trees ; or should give to the goodly bull, the
master and the fairest of the whole herd, a
thousand fair stags ; if a man should present to
a child a ship laden with Persian carpets, and
the ingredients of the rich scarlet ; all these,
being disproportionate either to the appetite or
to the understanding, could add nothing of
content, and might declare the freeness of the
presenter, but they upbraid the incapacity of
the receiver. And so it does if God should
give the whole world to any man. He knows
not what to do with it ; he can use no more

WORLDLY POSSESSIONS. 209

but according to the capacities of a man ; he
can use nothing but meat and drink and
clothes ; and infinite riches, that can give him
changes of raiment every day and a full table,
do but give him a clean trencher every bit he
eats ; it signifies no more but wantonness, and
variety to the same, not to new purposes.

He to whom the world can be given to any
purpose gi'eater than a private estate can min-
ister, must have new capacities created in him :
he needs the understanding of an angel, to
take the accounts of his estate ; he had need
have a stomach like fire or the grave, for else
he can eat no more than one of his healthful
subjects ; and unless he hath an eye like the
sun, and a motion like that of a thought, and a
bulk as big as one of the orbs of heaven, the
pleasure of his eye can be no greater than to
behold the beauty of a little prospect from a
hill, or to look upon the heap of gold packed
up in a httle room, or to dote upon a cabinet
of jewels, better than which there is no man
that sees at all but sees every day. For, not
to name the beauties and sparkling diamonds
of heaven, a man's, or a woman's, or a hawk's
eye is more beauteous and excellent than all
the jewels of his crown. And when we re-
member that a beast, who hath quicker senses
than a man, yet hath not so great delight in
the fruition of any object, because he wants

14

210 WORLDLY POSSESSIONS.

understanding, and the power to make reflex
acts upon his perception ; it will follow, that
understanding and knowledge is the greatest
instrument of pleasure, and he that is most
knowing hath a capacity to become happy,
which a less knowing prince or a rich person
hath not ; and in this only a man's capacity is
capable of enlargement. But then, although
they only have power to relish any pleasure
rightly, who rightly understand the nature and
degrees, and essences, and ends of things ; yet
they that do so, understand also the vanity and
the unsatisfyingness of the things of this world,
so that the relish which could not be great but
in a great understanding, appears contemptible,
because its vanity appears at the same time ;
the understanding sees all, and sees through it.
The greatest vanity of this world is remark-
able in this, that all its joys summed up to-
gether are not big enough to counterpoise the
evil of one sharp disease, or to allay a sorrow.
For imagine a man great in his dominion as
Cyrus, rich as Solomon, victorious as David,
beloved like Titus, learned as Trismegist, pow-
erful as all the Roman greatness ; all this, and
the results of all this, give him no more pleas-
ure in the midst of a fever or the tortures of
the stone, than if he were only lord of a little
dish, and a dishful of fountain-water. Indeed
the excellency of a holy conscience is a comfort

WORLDLY POSSESSIONS. 211

and a magazine of joy, so great, that it sweet-
ens the most bitter potion of the world, and
makes tortures and death not only tolerable,
but amiable ; and therefore to part with this
whose excellency is so great, for the world,
that is of so inconsiderable a worth, as not to
have in it recompense enough for the sorrows
of a sharp disease, is a bargain fit to be made
by none but fools and madmen. Antiochus
Epiphanes, and Herod the Great, and his
grandchild Agrippa, were sad instances of this
great trath ; to every of which it happened,
that the grandeur of their fortune, the great-
ness of their possessions, and the increase of
their estate disappeared and expired like cam-
phor, at their arrest by those several sharp
diseases, which covered their heads with cy-
press, and hid their crowns in an inglorious
grave.

For what can all the world minister to a sick
person, if it represents all the spoils of nature
and the choicest delicacies of land and sea ?
Alas ! his appetite is lost, and to see a pebble-
stone is more pleasing to him ; for he can look
upon that without loathing, but not so ujjon
the most delicious fare that ever made famous
the Roman luxury. Perfumes make his head
ache. If you load him with jewels, you press
him with a burden as troublesome as his gi*ave-
stone. And what pleasure is in all those pos-

212 WOBLDLY POSSESSIONS.

sessions that cannot make liis pillow easy, nor
tame the rebellion of a tumviltuous humor, nor
restore the use of a withered hand, or straight-
en a crooked finger ? Vain is the hope of that
man whose soul rests upon vanity and such
unprofitable possessions.

Suppose a man lord of all this world, a
universal monarch, as some princes have lately
designed, — all that cannot minister content to
him ; not that content which a poor contem-
plative man, by the strength of Christian phi-
losophy and the support of a very small fortune,
daily does enjoy. All his power and greatness
cannot command the sea to overflow his shores,
or to stay from retiring to the opposite strand.
It cannot make his children dutiful or wise.
And though the world admired at the great-
ness of Philip the Second's fortune in the ac-
cession of Portugal and the East Indies to his
prmcipalities, yet this could not allay the infe-
hcity of his family and the unhandsomeness of
his condition, in having a proud and indiscreet
and a vicious young prince likely to inherit all
his greatness. And if nothing appears in the
face of such a fortune to tell all the world that
it is spotted and imperfect, yet there is in all
conditions of the world such weariness and
tediousness of spirits, that a man is ever more
pleased with hopes of going off from the pres-
ent than in dwelling upon that condition which,

WORLDLY POSSESSIONS. 213

it may be, others admire and think beauteous,
but none knoweth the smart of it but he that
drank off the Httle pleasiu'e and felt the ill-rel-
ish of the appendage. How many kings have
groaned under the burden of their crowns,
and have sunk down and died ! How^ many
have quitted their pompous cares and retired
into private lives, there to enjoy the pleasures
of philosophy and religion, which their tlurones
denied !

That is a sad condition when, like Midas, all
that the man touches shall turn to eold : and
his is no better to whom a perpetual full table,
not recreated with fasting, not made pleasant
with intervening scarcitv, ministers no more
good than a heap of gold does ; that is, he hath
no benefit of it, save the beholding of it with
his eyes. Cannot a man quench his thirst as
well out of an urn or chalice, as out of a whole
river ? It is an ambitious thirst and a pride of
draught, that had rather lay his mouth to Eu-
phrates than to a petty goblet ; but if he had
rather, it adds not so much to his content as
to his danger and his vanity. For so I have
heard of persons whom the river hath swept
away, together with the turf they pressed, when
they stopped to drown their pride rather than
their thirst.

214 EXCELLENCE OF THE SOUL.

EXCELLENCE OF THE SOUL.

TF we consider what the soul is, in its own
-*- capacity to happiness, we shall find it to be
an excellency greater than the sun, of an angel-
ical substance, sister to a cherub, an image of
the divinity, and the great argument of that
mercy whereby God did distinguish us from
the lower form of beasts and trees and min-
erals.

The soul is all that whereby we may be, and
without which we cannot be, happy. It is not
the eye that sees the beauties of the heaven,
nor the ear that hears the sweetness of music
or the glad tidings of a prosperous accident, but
the soul that perceives all the relishes of sen-
sual and intellectual perfections ; and the more
noble and excellent the soul is, the greater and
more savory are its perceptions. And if a
child beholds the rich ermine, or the diamonds
of a starry night, or the order of the world, or
hears the discourses of an apostle, because he
makes no reflex acts upon himself, and sees
not that he sees, he can have but the pleasure
of a fool, or the deliciousness of a mule. But
although the reflection of its own acts be a rare
instrument of pleasure or pain respectively, yet
the soul's excellence is upon the same reason
not perceived by us, by which the sapidness

EXCELLENCE OF TEE SOUL. 215

of pleasant things of nature are not understood
by a child ; even because the soul cannot re-
flect far enough. For as the sun, wliich is the
fountain of hght and heat, makes violent and
direct emissions of his rays fi'om himself, but
reflects them no farther than to the bottom of
a cloud, or the lowest imaginary circle of the
middle region, and therefore receives not a
duplicate of its own heat ; so is the soul of
man : it reflects upon its own inferior actions
of particular sense or general undei'standing ;
but because it knows little of its own natui'e,
the manners of volition, the immediate instru-
ments of understanding, the Avay how it comes
to meditate, and cannot discern how a sudden
thought arrives, or the solution of a doubt not
depending upon preceding premises ; there-
fore above half its pleasures are abated, and
its own worth less understood : and possibly it
is the better it is so. If the elephant knew his
strength, or the horse the vigorousness of his
own spirit, they would be as rebellious against
their rulers as unreasonable men against eov-
ernment : nay, the angels themselves, because
their light reflected home to their orbs, and
they understood all the secrets of their own
perfection, they grew vertiginous, and fell from
the battlements of heaven.

216 THE REWARDS OF VIRTUE.

THE REWARDS OF VIRTUE.

^HE things of God are the. noblest satisfac-
-■- tions to those desh'es which ono-ht to be
cherished and swelled up to infinite ; their
deliciousness is vast and full of relish ; and
their very appendant thorns are to be chosen,
for they are gilded, they are safe and medic-
inal, they heal the wound they make, and
bring forth fruit of a blessed and a holy hfe.
The things of God and of religion are easy
and sweet, they bear entertainments in their
hand and reward at their back ; their good is
certain and perpetual, and they make us cheer-
ful to-day, and pleasant to-morrow ; and spirit-
ual songs end not in a sigh and a groan, but
they bring us to the felicity of God, the same
yesterday and to-day and forever. They do
not give a private and particular delight, but
their benefit is public ; like the incense of the
altar, it sends up a sweet smell to heaven, and
makes atonement for the religious man that
kindled it, and delights all the standers-by,
and makes the very air wholesome. There is
no blessed soul goes to heaven but he makes
a general joy in all the mansions where the
saints do dwell, and in all the chapels where
the angels sing ; and the joys of religion are
not univocal, but productive of rare and acci-

THE REWARDS OF VIRTUE. 217

dental and preternatural pleasures ; for the
music of holy hymns dehghts the ear and re-
freshes the sph-it, and makes the very bones
of the saints to rejoice. And charity, or the
giving alms to the poor, does not only ease the
poverty of the receiver, but makes the giver
rich, and heals his sickness, and dehvers from
death. And temperance, though it be in the
matter of meat and drink and pleasm-es, yet
hath an effect upon the understanding, and
makes the reason sober, and the will orderly,
and the affections regular, and does thmgs be-
side and beyond their natural and proper effi-
cacy : for all the parts of our duty are watered
with the showers of blessing, and bring forth
fruit according to the influence of heaven, and
beyond the capacities of natm'e.

But they that ^\^ll not deny a lust, nor re-
frain an appetite, they that will be drunk when
their friends do merrily constrain them, or love
a cheap religion, and a gentle and lame prayer,
short and soft, quickly said and soon passed
over, seldom returning and but little observed,
how is it possible that they should think them-
selves persons disposed to receive such glorious
crowns and sceptres, such excellent conditions,
which they have not faith enough to beheve,
nor attention enough to consider, and no man
can have wit enough to understand ? But so
might an Arcadian shepherd look from the

218 RELIGION AND GOVERNMENT.

rocks, or tlirough the clifts of the valley where
his sheep graze, and wonder that the messen-
ger stays so long from coming to him to be
crowned king of all the Greek islands, or to be
adopted heir to the Macedonian monarchy. It
is an infinite love of God that we have heaven
upon conditions which we can perform with
greatest diligence : but, truly, the lives of men
are generally such that they do things in order
to heaven, things (I say) so few, so trifling, so
unworthy, that they are not proportionable to
the reward of a crown of oak or a yellow rib-
bon, the slender reward with which the Ro-
mans paid their soldiers for their extraordinary
valor. True it is, that heaven is not in a just
sense of a commutation, a reward, but a gift,
and an infinite favor : but yet it is not reached
forth but to persons disposed by the conditions
of God ; which conditions when we pursue in
kind, let us be very careful we do not fail of
the mighty prize of our high calling for want
of degrees and just measures, the measures of
zeal and a mighty love.

EELIGION AND GOVERNMENT.

THOSE sects of Christians, whose professed
doctrine brings destruction and diminution

RELIGION AND GOVERNMENT. 219

to government, give the most intolerable scan-
dal and dishonor to the institution ; and it had
been impossible that Christianity should have
prevailed over the wisdom and power of the
Greeks and Romans, if it had not been humble
to superiors, patient of injuries, charitable to
the needy, a great exacter of obedience to
kings, even to heathens, that they might be
won and convinced ; and to persecutors, that
they might be sweetened in their anger, or up-
braided for their cruel injustice. For so doth
the humble vine creep at the foot of an oak,
and leans upon its lowest base, and begs shade
and protection, and leave to grow under its
branches, and to give and take mutual refresh-
ment, and pay a friendly influence for a mighty
patronage ; and they gi'ow and dwell together,
and are the most remarkable of friends and
married pairs of all the leafy nation. Religion
of itself is soft, easy, and defenceless, and God
hath made it grow up with empire, and lean
upon the arms of kings, and it cannot well
grow alone ; and if it shall, like the ivy, suck
the heart of the oak, upon whose body it grew
and Avas supported, it will be pulled down from
its usurped eminence, and fire and shame shall
be its portion.

220 HYPO CRIST.

HYPOCRISY.

WJ E do not live in an age in which there is
* * so much need to bid men be wary, as to
take care that they be innocent. Indeed in
rehgion we are usually too loose and ungirt,
exposing ourselves to temptation, and others to
offence, and our name to dishonor, and the
cause itself to reproach, and we are open and
ready to every evil but persecution. From
that we are close enoiigh, and that alone we
call prudence ; but in the matter of interest we
are wary as serpents, subtle as foxes, vigilant
as the birds of the night, rapacious as kites,
tenacious as grappling-hooks and the weightiest
anchors, and, above all, false and hypocritical
as a thin crust of ice spread upon the face of a
deep, smooth, and dissembling pit ; if you set
your foot, your foot slips, or the ice breaks, and
you sink into death, and are wound in a sheet
of water, descending into mischief or your
grave, suffering a great fall, or a sudden death,
by your confidence and unsuspecting foot.
There is a universal crust of hypocrisy that
covers the face of the greatest part of man-
kind. Their religion consists in forms and
outsides, and serves reputation or a design, but
does not serve God. Their promises are but
fair language, and the civilities of piazzas or

HYPOCRISY. 221

exchanges, and disband and untie like the air
that beats upon their teeth when they speak
the dehcious and hopeful words. Their oaths
are snares to catch men, and make them confi-
dent ; their contracts are arts and stratagems
to deceive, measured by profit and possibility ;
and everything is lawful that is gainful ; and
their friendships are trades of getting ; and
their kindness of watching a dymg friend is
but the office of a vulture, the gaping for a
legacy, the spoil of the carcase ; and their sick-
nesses are many times policies of state, some-
times a design to show the riches of our bed-
chamber : and their funeral tears are but the
paranymphs and pious solicitors of a second
bride. And everything that is ugly must be
hid, and everything that is handsome must
be seen : and that will make a fair cover
for a huge deformity. And therefore it is
(as they think) necessary that men should
always have some pretences and forms, some
faces of rehgion or sweetness of language, con-
fident affirmatives or bold oaths, protracted
treaties or multitude of words, affected silence
or grave deportment, a good name or a good
cause, a fair relation or a worthy calling, great
power or a pleasant wit. Anything that can
be fair or that can be useful, anything that can
do good or be thought good, we use it to abuse
our brother, or promote our mterests. Lepo-

222 CHRIST'S DISCIPLES.

rina resolved to die, being troubled for her hus-
band's danger ; and he resolved to die with
her that had so great a kindness for him, as
not to outlive the best of her husband's for-
tune. It was agreed ; and she tempered the
poison, and drank the face of the unwholesome
goblet ; but the weighty poison sunk to the
bottom, and the easy man drank it all off, and
died, and the woman carried him forth to fu-
neral, and after a little illness, which she soon
recovered, she entered upon the inheritance,
and a second marriage.

CHRIST'S DISCIPLES.

"Y^HEN our blessed Saviour told his disciples
' ' that they should sit upon twelve thrones,
they presently thought they had his bond for a
kingdom, and dreamed of wealth and honor,
power and a splendid court ; and Christ knew
they did, but did not disentangle his promise
from the enfolded and intricate sense, of which
his words were naturally capable ; but he per-
formed his promise to better purposes than
they hoped for. They were presidents in the
conduct of souls, princes of God's people, the
chief in sufferings, stood nearest to the cross,
had an elder brother's portion in the kingdom

TEE MIRACLES OF THE DIVINE MERCY. 223

of grace, were the founders of churches, and
dispensers of the mysteries of the kingdom,
and ministers of the spirit of God, and chan-
nels of mighty blessings, under-mediators in
the priesthood of their Lord, and " their names
were written in heaven " : and this was infi-
nitely better than to groan and wake under a
head pressed with a golden crown and pungent
cares, and to eat alone, and to walk in a crowd,
and to be vexed with all the public and many
of the private evils of the people, which is the
sum total of an earthly kingdom.

THE MIEACLES OF THE DIVINE MERCY.

T

HE light of the world in the morning of the
creation was spread abroad like a curtain,
and dwelt nowhere, but filled the " expansum"
with a dissemination great as the unfoldings of
the air's looser garment, or the wilder fi-inges
of the fire, without knots, or order, or combi-
nation. But God gathered the beams in his
hand, and united them into a globe of fire, and
all the light of the world became the body of
the sun ; and he lent some to his weaker sister
that walks in the night, and guides a traveller,
and teaches him to distinsuish a house from a
river, or a rock from a plain field. So is the

224 THE MIRACLES OF THE DIVINE MERCT.

Diercy of God, a vast " expansum " and a huge
ocean ; from eternal ages it dwelt round about
the throne of God, and it filled all that infinite
distance and space that hath no measures but
the will of God ; until God, desiring to com-
municate that excellence and make it relative,
created angels, that he might have persons
capable of huge gifts, and man, who he knew
would need forgiveness. For so the angels,
our elder brothers, dwelt forever in the house
of their father, and never broke his command-
ments ; but we, the yormger, like prodigals,
forsook our father's house, and went into a
strange country, and followed stranger courses,
and spent the portion of our nature, and for-
feited all our title to the family, and came to
need another portion. For, ever since the fall
of Adam, who, like an unfortunate man, spent
all that a wretched man could need, or a happy
man could have, our life is repentance, and
forgiveness is all our portion ; and though
angels were objects of God's bounty, yet man
only is (in proper speaking) the object of his
mercy ; and the mercy which dwelt in an in-
finite circle, became confined to a little ring,
and dwelt here below, and here shall dwell be-
low till it hath carried all God's portion up to
heaven, where it shall reign and glory upon
our crowned heads forever and ever.

But for him that considers God's mercies,

TEE MIRACLES OF THE DIVINE MERCY. 225

and dwells awhile in that depth, it is hard not
to talk wildly and without art and order of dis-
coursing. St. Peter talked he knew not what,
when he entered into a cloud with Jesus upon
Mount Tabor, though it passed over him like
the little curtains that ride upon the north-
wind, and pass between the sun and us. And
when we converse with a light greater than
the sun, and taste a sweetness more delicious
than the dew of heaven, and in our thoug-hts
entertain the ravishments and harmony of that
atonement which reconciles God to man, and
man to fehcity, it will be more easily pardoned
if we should be like persons that admire much
and say but little ; and indeed we can best con-
fess the glories of the Lord by dazzled eyes,
and a stammering tongue, and a heart over-
charged with the miracles of this mfinity. For
so those little drops that run over, though they
be not much in themselves, yet they tell that
the vessel was full, and could express the gi-eat-
ness of the shower no otherwise but by spilling,
and inartificial expressions and runnings over.

But because I have undertaken to tell the
drops of the ocean, and to span the measures
of eternity, I must do it by the great lines of
revelation and experience, and tell concerning
God's mercy as we do concerning God himself,
that he is that great fountain of which we all

drink, and the great rock of which we all eat,
15

226 THE MIRACLES OF THE DIVINE MERCY.

and on which we all dwell, and under whose
shadow we are all refreshed. God's mercy is
all this ; and we can only draw great lines of
it, and reckon the constellations of our hemi-
sphere instead of telling the number of the
stars ; we only can reckon what we feel and
what we live by. And though there be in
every one of these lines of life enough to en-
gage us forever to do God service, and to give
him praises ; yet it is certain there are very
many mercies of God upon us, and towards us,
and concerning us, which we neither feel, nor
see, nor understand as yet ; but yet we are
blessed by them, and are preserved and se-
cured, and we shall then know them when we
come to give God thanks in the festivities of
an eternal sabbath.

In this accomit concerning the mercies of
God, I must not reckon the miracles and graces
of the creation, or anything of the nature of
man ; nor tell how great an endearment God
passed upon us, that 'he made us men, capable
of felicity, apted with rare instruments of dis-
course and reason, passions and desires, notices
of sense, and reflections upon that sense ; that
we have not the deformity of a crocodile, nor
the motion of a worm, nor the hunger of a
wolf, nor the wildness of a tiger, nor the birth,
of vipers, nor the life of flies, nor the death of
serpents.

THE MIRACLES OF THE DIVINE MERCY. 227

Our excellent bodies and useful faculties, the
upright motion and the tenacious hand, the fair
appetites and proportioned satisfactions, our
speech and our perceptions, our acts of life,
the rare invention of letters, and the use of
writing, and speaking at a distance, the inter-
vals of rest and labor, (either of which, if they
were perpetual, would be intolerable,) the needs
of nature and the provisions of providence,
sleep and business, refreshments of the body
and entertainments of the soul ; these are to be
reckoned as acts of bounty rather than mercy.
God gave us these Avhen he made us, and be-
fore we needed mercy ; these were portions of
our nature, or provided to supply our conse-
quent necessities. But when Ave forfeited all
God's favor by our sins, then that they were
continued or restored to us became a mercy,
and therefore ought to be reckoned upon this
new account : for it was a rare mercy that we
were suflPered to live at all, or that the anger of
God did pennit to us one blessing, that he did
punish us so gently. We looked for a judge,
and behold a Saviour ; we feared an accuser,
and behold an advocate ; we sat down in sor-
row, and rise in joy ; we leaned upon rhubarb
and aloes, and our aprons were made of the
sharp leaves of Indian fig-trees, and so we fed,
and so were clothed ; but the rhubarb proved
medicinal, and the rough leaf of the tree

228 THE MIRACLES OF THE DIVINE MERCY.

brought its fruit wrapped up in its foldings ;
and round about our dwellings was planted a
hediie of thorns and bundles of thistles, the
aconite and the briony, the nightshade and the
poppy ; and at the root of these grew the heal-
ing plantain, which, rising up into a tallness by
the friendly invitation of heavenly influence,
turned about the tree of the cross, and cured
the wounds of the thorns, and the curse of the
thistles, and the malediction of man, and the
wrath of God.

After all this, we may sit down and reckon
by great sums and conjugations of his gracious
gifts, and tell the minutes of eternity by the
number of the divine mercies. God hath given
his laws to rule us, his word to instruct us, his
spirit to guide us, his angels to protect us, his
ministers to exhort us. He revealed all our
duty, and he hath concealed whatsoever can
liinder us ; he hath affrighted our follies with
fear of death, and engaged our watchfulness
by its secret coming ; he hath exercised our
faith by keeping private the state of souls de-
parted, and yet hath confirmed our faith by a
promise of a resurrection, and entertained our
hope by some general significations of the state
of interval. His mercies make contemptible
means instrumental to great purposes, and a
small herb the remedy of the greatest diseases.
He impedes the devil's rage, and infatuates his

THE MIRACLES OF THE DIVINE MERCY. 229

counsels ; lie diverts his malice, and defeats
his purposes ; he binds him in the chain of
darkness, and gives him no power over the
children of ho-ht ; he suffers him to walk in soli-
tary places, and yet fetters him that he cannot
disturb the sleep of a child ; he hath given him
mighty power, and yet a young maiden that
resists him shall make him flee awav ; he hath
given him a vast knowledge, and yet an igno-
rant man can confute him with the twelve ar-
ticles of his creed ; he gave him power over the
winds, and made him prince of the air, and
yet the breath of a holy prayer can drive him
as far as the utmost sea ; and he hath so re-
strained him, that (except it be by faith) we
know not whether there be any devil, yea or
no ; for we never heard his noises, nor have
seen his aftVighting shapes.

This is that great principle of all the felic-
ity we hope for, and of all the means thither,
and of all the skill and all the streno-ths we
have to use those means. He hath made great
variety of conditions, and yet hath made all
necessar}^ and all mutual helpers ; and by some
instruments and in some respects they are all
equal, in order to felicity, to content, and final
and intermedial satisfaction. He gave us part
of our reward in hand, that he might enable
us to work for more : he taught the world
arts for use, arts for entertainment of all our

230 THE MIRACLES OF THE DIVINE MERCY.

faculties and all our dispositions : lie gives
eternal gifts for temporal services, and gives
us whatsoever we want for asking, and com-
mands us to ask, and threatens us if we will
not ask, and pimishes us for refusing to be
happy. This is that glorious attribute that hath
made order and health, harmony and hope, res-
titutions and variety, the joys of direct posses-
sion, and the joys, the artificial joys, of contra-
riety and comparison. He comforts the poor,
and he brings down the rich, that they may be
safe, in their humility and sorrow, from the
transportations of an unhappy and uninstructed
prosperity. He gives necessaries to all, and
scatters the extraordinary provisions so, that
every nation may traffic in charity, and com-
mute for pleasures. He was the Lord of hosts,
and he is still what he was ; but he loves to be
called the God of peace ; because he was ter-
rible in that, but he is delighted in this.

His mercy is his glory, and his glory is the
light of heaven. His mercy is the life of the
creation, and it fills all the earth ; and his
mercy is a sea too, and it fills all the abysses
of the deep ; it hath given us promises for sup-
ply of whatsoever we need, and relieves us in
all our fears, and in all the evils that we suffer.
His mercies are more than we can tell, and
they are more than we can feel. For all the
world in the abyss of the divine mercies is like

THE MIRACLES OF THE DIVINE MERCY. 231

a man diving into the bottom of the sea, over
whose head the waters run insensibly and un-
perceived, and yet the weight is vast, and the
sura of them is immeasurable ; and the man is
not pressed with the burden, nor confounded
with numbers. And no observation is able
to recount, no sense sufficient to perceive, no
memory large enough to retain, no understand-
ing great enough to apprehend this infinity ;
but we must admire, and love, and worship,
and magnify this mercy forever and ever ; that
we may dwell in what we feel, and be compre-
hended by that which is equal to God, and the
parent of all felicity.

The result of this consideration is, that as we
fear the divine judgments, so we adore and love
his goodness, and let the golden chains of the
divine mercy tie us to a noble prosecution of
our duty and the interest of religion. For he is
the worst of men whom kindness cannot soften,
nor endearment oblige, whom gratitude cannot
tie faster than the bands of life and death. He
is an ill-natured sinner, if he will not comply
with the sweetnesses of heaven, and be civil to
his angel guardian, or observant of his patron,
God, who made him, and feeds him, and keeps
all his faculties, and takes care of him, and en-
dures his follies, and waits on him more ten-
derly than a nurse, more diligently than a cli-
ent; who hath greater care of him than his

232 NATIONAL ADVERSITY.

father, and whose bowels yearn over him with
more compassion than a mother ; who is boun-
tiful beyond our need, and merciful beyond our
hopes, and makes capacities in us to receive
more. Fear is stronger than death, and love is
more prevalent than fear, and kindness is the
greatest endearment of love ; and yet to an
ingenuous person gratitude is greater than all
these, and obliges to a solemn duty, when love
fails, and fear is dull and unactive, and death
itself is despised. But the man who is hard-
ened against kindness, and whose duty is not
made alive with gratitude, must be used like a
slave, and driven like an ox, and enticed with
goads and whips ; but must never enter into
the inheritance of sons. Let us take heed ; for
mercy is like a rainbow, which God set in the
clouds to remember mankind : it shines here as
long as it is not hindered ; but we must never
look for it after it is night, and it shines not in
the other world. If we refuse mercy here, we
shall have justice to eternity.

NATIONAL ADVERSITY.

IT is a sad calamity to see a kingdom spoiled
and a church afflicted ; the priests slain
with the sword, and the blood of nobles min-

NATIONAL ADVERSITY. 233

gled with cheaper sand ; rehgion made a cause
of trouble, and the best men most cruelly
persecuted ; government confounded and laws
ashamed ; judges decreemg causes in fear and
covetousness, and the ministers of holy things
setting themselves agamst all that is sacred,
and setting fire upon the fields, and turning in
little foxes on purpose to destroy the vine-
yards. And what shall make recompense for
this heap of sorrows, whenever God shall send
such swords of fire ? Even the mercies of
God, which then will be made public, when
we shall hear such afflicted people sing, " In
convertendo cajjtivitatem Sion" Avith the voice
of joy and festival eucharist among such as
keep holiday ; and when peace shall become
sweeter and dwell the longer. And in the
mean time it serves religion, and the affliction
shall try the children of God, and God shall
crown them, and men shall grow wiser and
more holy, and leave their petty interests, and
take sanctuary in holy Hving, and be taught
temperance by their want, and patience by
their suffering, and charity by their persecu-
tion, and shall better understand the duty of
their relations ; and at last the secret worm
that lay at the root of the plant shall be drawn
forth and quite extinguished. For so have I
known a luxuriant vine swell into irregular
twigs and bold excrescences, and spend itself

234 EVANGELICAL RIGHTEOUSNESS.

in leaves and little rings, and afford but trifling
clusters to the wine-press, and a faint return to
his heart, which longed to be refreshed with a
full vintage : but when the lord of the vine had
caused the dressers to cut the wilder plant, and
made it bleed, it grew temperate in its vain ex-
pense of useless leaves, and knotted into fair
and juicy branches, and made accounts of that
loss of blood by the return of fruit. So is an
afflicted province cured of its surfeits, and pun-
ished for its sins, and bleeds for its long riot,
and is left ungoverned for its disobedience, and
chastised for its wantonness ; and when the
sword hath let forth the corrupted blood, and
the fire hath purged the rest, then it enters
into the double joys of restitution, and gives
God thanks for his rod, and confesses the mer-
cies of the Lord in making the smoke to be
changed into fire, and the cloud into a per-
fume, the sword into a staff, and his anger into
mercy.

EVANGELICAL RIGHTEOUSNESS.

TX7E must know that in keeping of God's
" ' commandments every degree of internal
duty is under the commandments ; and there-
fore Avhatever we do, we must do it as well as

EVANGELICAL RIGHTEOUSNESS. 235

we can. Now he that does his duty with the
biggest affection he can, will also do all that he
can ; and he can never know that he hath done
what is commanded, unless he does all that is
in his power. For God hath put no limit but
love and possibility ; and therefore whoever
says. Hither will I go and no farther, this I
will do and no more, thus much will I serve
God, but that shall be all, — he hath the affec-
tions of a slave, and the religion of a Pharisee,
the craft of a merchant, and the falseness of a
broker ; but he hath not the proper measures
of the righteousness evanorelical. But so it
happens in the mud and slime of the river
Borborus, when the eye of the sun hath long
dwelt upon it, and produces frogs and mice
which begin to move a little under a thin cover
of its own parental matter, and if they can get
loose to live half a Hfe, that is all ; but the
hinder parts, which are not formed before the
setting of the sun, stick fast in their beds of
mud, and the little moiety of a creature dies be-
fore it could be well said to live. So it is with
those Christians who will do all that they think
lawful, and will do no more than what they
suppose necessary ; they do but peep into the
light of the sun of righteousness ; they have
the beginnings of life ; but their hinder parts,
their passions and affections, and the desires of
the lower man, are still unformed ; and he

23 6 WA TCHF ULNE88.

that dwells in this state is just so much of a
Christian as a sponge is of a plant, and a mush-
room of a shrub : they may be as sensible as
an oyster, and discourse at the rate of a child,
but are greatly short of the righteousness
evangelical.

WATCHFULNESS.

TTE that would be free from the slavery of
-*--'- sin, and the necessity of sinning, must al-
ways watch. Ay, that 's the point ; but who
can watch always ? Why, every good man can
watch always : and that we may not be de-
ceived in this, let us know that the running
away from a temptation is a part of our watch-
ftilness, and every good employment is another
great part of it, and a laying in pro-^nsion of
reason and religion beforehand, is yet a third
part of this watchfrilness : and the conversation
of a Christian is a perpetual watchfulness ; not
a continual thinking of that one, or those many
things which may endanger us ; but it is a
continual doing something directly or indirectly
against sin. He either prays to God for his
spirit, or relies upon the promises, or receives
the sacrament, or goes to his bishop for counsel
and a blessing, or to his priest for religious

WATCHFULNESS. 237

oflSces, or places himself at the feet of good
men to hear their Avise sayings, or calls for the
Church's prayers, or does the duty of his call-
ing, or actually resists temptation, or frequently
renews his holy pui-poses, or fortifies himself
by vows, or searches into his danger by a daily
examination ; so that in the whole he is for-
ever upon his guard. This duty and caution
of a Christian is like watching lest a man cut
his finger. Wise men do not often cut their
fingers, and yet every day they use a knife ;
and a man's eye is a tender thing, and every-
thing can do it wrong, can put it out ; yet be-
cause we love our eyes so well, in the midst of
so many dangers, by God's proyidence and a
prudent natural care, by winking when any-
thing comes against them, and by turning aside
when a blow is offered, they are preserved so
certainly, that not one in ten thousand does by
a stroke lose one of his eyes in all his lifetime.
If we would transplant our natural care to a
spiritual caution, we might by God's grace be
kept from losing our souls, as Ave are from los-
ing our eyes ; and because a perpetual watch-
fulness is our great defence, and the perpetual
presence of God's grace is our great security,
and that this grace never leaves us unless we
leave it, and the precept of a daily watchful-
ness is a thing not only so reasonable, but so
many easy ways to be performed, we see upon

238 PITY.

what terms we may be quit of our sins, and
more than conquerors over all the enemies and
impediments of salvation.

PITY.

TF you do but see a maiden carried to her
-*- grave a little before her intended marriage,
or an infant die before the birth of reason, na-
ture hath taught us to pay a tributary tear.
Alas ! your eyes will behold the ruin of many
families, which, though they sadly have de-
served, yet mercy is not delighted with the
spectacle ; and therefore God places a watery
cloud in the eye, that when the light of heaven
shines upon it, it may produce a rainbow to be
a sacrament and a memorial that God and the
sons of God do not love to see a man perish.
God never rejoices in the death of him that
dies ; and we also esteem it undecent to have
music at a funeral. And as religion teaches us
to pity a condemned criminal, so mercy inter-
cedes for the most benign interpretation of the
laws. You must indeed be as just as the laws,
and you must be as merciful as your religion ;
and you have no way to tie these together but
to follow the pattern in the mount : do as God
does, who in judgment remembers mercy.

THE HOPE OF MAN. 239

THE HOPE OF MAN.

nPRULY, what is the hope of man ? It is
-*- indeed the resurrection of the soul in this
world from sorrow and her saddest pressures,
and Hke the twilight to the day, and the har-
bmger of joy ; but still it is but a conjugation
of infirmities, and proclaims our present calam-
ity ; only because it is uneasy here, it thrusts
us forwards toward the light and glory of the
resurrection.

For as a worm, creeping with her belly on
the ground, with her portion and share of
Adam's curse, lifts up its head to partake a
little of the blessings of the air, and opens the
junctures of her imperfect body, and curls her
little rings into knots and combinations, draw-
ing up her tail to a neighborhood of the head's
pleasure and motion ; but still it must return to
abide the fate of its own nature, and dwell and
sleep upon the dust : so are the hopes of a
mortal man ; he opens his eyes and looks upon
fine things at a distance, and shuts them again
with weakness, because they are too glorious
to behold; and the man rejoices because he
hopes fine things are staying for him ; but his
heart aches, because he knows there are a
thousand ways to fail and miss of those glories :
and though he hopes, yet he enjoys not; he

240 THE RESURRECTION.

longs, but he possesses not ; and must be con-
tent with his portion of dust, and being " a
worm and no man," must lie down in this por-
tion, before he can receive the end of his hopes,
the salvation of his soul in the resurrection of
the dead. For as death is the end of our lives,
so is the resurrection the end of our hopes ;
and as w^e die daily, so we daily hope. But
death, which is the end of our life, is the en-
largement of our spirits from hope to certainty,
from uncertain fears to certain expectations,
from the death of the body to the life of the
soul.

THE RESURRECTION.

TA/'HEN man was not, what power, what
' ' causes made him to be ? Whatsoever it
was, it did then as great a work as to raise his
body to the same being again ; and because
we know not the method of nature's secret
changes, and how we can be fashioned beneath
" in secreto terrce" and cannot handle and dis-
cern the possibilities and seminal powers in the
ashes of dissolved bones, must our ignorance in
philosophy be put in balance against the articles
of religion, the hopes of mankind, the faith of
nations, and the truth of God? And are our
opinions of the power of God so low, that our

THE RESURRECTION. 241

understanding must be liis measiu'e, and he
shall be confessed to do nothmg unless it be
made plain in our philosophy ? Certainly we
have a low opinion of God unless we beheve
he can do more things than we can understand.
But let us hear St. Paul's demonstration : if
the corn dies and lives again ; if it lays its body
down, suffers alteration, dissolution and death,
but at the spring rises again in the verdm'e
of a leaf, in the fulness of the ear, in the kid-
neys of wheat ; if it proceeds from little to
great, from nakedness to ornament, from emp-
tiness to plenty, from unity to multitude, fi-om
death to life ; be a Sadducee no more, shame
not thy understanding, and reproach not the
weakness of thy faith, by thinking that corn
can be restored to life, and man cannot; espe-
cially since in every creature the obediential
capacity is infinite, and cannot admit degrees ;
for every creature can be anything under the
power of God, which cannot be less than in-
finite.

But we find no obscure footsteps of this
mystery even amongst the heathens. Pliny
reports that Appion the grammarian, by the
use of the plant Osiris, called Homer fi'om his
grave ; and in Valerius Maximus we find that
^lius Tubero returned to life when he was
seated in his funeral pile ; and in Plutarch, that
Soleus, after three days' burial, did live ; and
16

242 THE RESURRECTION.

in Valerius, that Mv\s Pamphilius did so after
ten days. And it was so commonly believed
that Glaucus, who was choked in a vessel of
honey, did rise again, that it grew to a prov-
erb; " Cflaucus poto melle surrexit,^^ Glaucus
having tasted honey, died and lived again. I
pretend not to beheve these stories to be true ;
but from these instances it may be concluded,
that they believed it possible that there should
be a resurrection from the dead ; and natural
reason and their philosophy did not wholly de-
stroy their hopes and expectation to have a
portion in this article.

For God, knowing that the great hopes of
man, that the biggest endearment of religion,
the sanction of private justice, the band of piety
and holy courage, does wholly derive from the
article of the resurrection, was pleased not only
to make it credible, but easy and familiar to
us ; and we so converse every night with the
image of death, that every morning we find an
argument of the resurrection. Sleep and death
have but one mother, and they have one name
in common.

Charnel-houses are but cemeteries or sleep-
ing-places, and they that die are fallen asleep,
and the resurrection is but an awakening and
standing-up from sleep. But in sleep our sen-
ses are as fast bound by nature as our joints are
by the grave-clothes ; and unless an angel of

THE RESURRECTION. 243

God awaken us everv^ morning, we must con-
fess ourselves as unable to converse with men
as we now are afraid to die and to converse
with spirits.

I will not now insist upon the story of the
rising bones seen every year in Egypt, nor the
pretences of the chemists, that they from the
ashes of flowers can reproduce from the same
materials the same beauties in color and figure ;
for he that proves a certain truth fi'om an
uncertain argument, is like him that wears a
wooden leg when he hath two sound legs al-
ready ; it hinders his going, but helps him
not. The truth of God stands not in need of
such supporters; nature alone is a sufficient
preacher. Night and day, the sun returning
to the same point of east, every change of
species in the same matter, generation and
coiTuption, the eagle renewing her youth and
the snake her skin, the silk- worm and the
swallows, the care of posterity and the care
of an immortal name, winter and summer, the
fall and spring, the Old Testament and the
New, the words of Job and the visions of the
Prophets, the prayer of Ezekiel for the resur-
rection of the men of Ephraim and the return
of Jonas from the whale's belly, the histories
of the Jews and the narratives of Christians,
the faith of believers and the philosophy of the
reasonable, — all join in the verification of this

244 RESURRECTION OF SINNERS.

mystery. And amongst these heaps it is not
of the least consideration that there was never
any good man, who having been taught this
article, but if he served God, he also relied
upon this. If he believed God, he believed
this.

RESURRECTION OF SINNERS.

SO have we seen a poor condemned criminal,
the weight of whose sorrows sitting heavily
upon his soul hath benumbed him into a deep
sleep, till he hath forgotten his groans, and laid
aside his deep sighings ; but on a sudden comes
the messenger of death and unbinds the poppy
garland, scatters the heavy cloud that encircled
his miserable head, and makes him return to
acts of life, that he may quickly descend into
death and be no more. So is every sinner that
lies down in shame and makes his grave with
the wicked ; he shall indeed rise again and be
called upon by the voice of the archangel ; but
then he shall descend into sorrows greater than
the reason and the patience of a man, weeping
and shrieking louder than the groans of the
miserable children in the valley of Humom.

THE DIVINE BOUNTY. 245

THE DIVINE BOUNTY.

THAT our desires are so provided for by-
nature and art, by ordinary and extraordi-
nary, by foresight and contingency, according
to necessity and up unto conveniency, until
we arrive at abundance, is a chain of mercies
larger than the bow in the clouds, and richer
than the trees of Eden, which were permitted
to feed our miserable father. Is not all the
earth our orchard and our granary, our vine-
yard and our garden of pleasure ? And the
face of the sea is our traffic, and the bowels of
the sea is our " vi'vanum," a place for fish to
feed us, and to serve some other collateral ap-
pendant needs ; and all the face of heaven is
a repository for influences and breath, fruitfol
showers and fair refreshments. And when
God made provision for his other creatures,
he gave it of one kind, and with variety no
greater than the changes of day and night, one
devouring the other, or sitting down with his
draught of blood, or Avalking upon his portion
of crrass. But man hath all the food of beasts,
and all the beasts themselves that are fit for
food, and the food of angels, and the dew of
heaven, and the fatness of the earth ; and every
part of his body hath a provision made for it.
And the smoothness of the olive and the juice

246 THE DIVINE BOUNTY.

of the vine refresh the heart, and make the face
cheerful, and serve the ends of joy and the fes-
tivity of man ; and are not only to cure hunger
or to allay thirst, but appease a passion and
allay a sorrow. It is an infinite variety of
meat mth which God furnishes out the table
of mankind. And in the covering our sin and
clothing our nakedness, God passed from fig-
leaves to the skins of beasts, from aprons to
long robes, from leather to wool, and from
thence to the warmth of furs and the coolness
of silks. He hath dressed not only our needs,
but hath fitted the several portions of the year,
and made us to go dressed like our mother,
leaving off the winter sables when the florid
spring appears, and as soon as the tulip fades
we put on the robe of summer, and then shear
our sheep for winter : and God uses us as Jo-
seph did his brother Benjamin ; we have many
changes of raiment, and our mess is five times
bigger than the provision made for om- brothers
of the creation.

But that which I shall observe in this whole
affair is, that there are, both for the provision
of our tables and the rehef of our sicknesses,
so many miracles of providence that they give
plain demonstration what relation we bear to
heaven. And the poor man need not be troub-
led that he is to expect his daily portion after
the sun is up ; for he hath found to this day

THE DIVINE BOUNTY. 247

he was not deceived ; and then he may rejoice,
because he sees, by an effective probation, that
in heaven a decree was made, every day to send
him provisions of meat and drink. And that is
a mighty mercy, when the circles of heaven are
bowed down to wrap us in a bosom of care and
nourishment, and the wisdom of God is daily
busied to serve his mercy, as his mercy serves
our necessities. Does not God plant remedies
there where the diseases are most popular ?
And every country is best provided against its
own evils. Is not the rhubarb found where the
sun most corrupts the hver, and the scabious
by the shore of the sea, that God might cure
as soon as he wounds? And the inhabitants
may see then' remedy against the leprosy and
the scurA^y, before they feel their sickness. And
then to this we may add nature's commons and
open fields, the shores of rivers and the strand
of the sea, the unconfined air, the wilderness
that hath no hedge ; and that in these every
man may hunt and fowl and fish respectively ;
and that God sends some miracles and extraor-
dinary blessings so for the public good, that he
will not endure they should be enclosed and
made several. Thus he is pleased to dispense
the manna of Calabria, the medicinal waters of
Germany, the muscles at Sluce at this day,
and the Egyptian beans in the marshes of Al-
bania, and the salt at Troas of old ; wliicli

248 THE DIVINE BOUNTY.

God, to defeat the covetousness of man, and
to spread his mercy over the face of the indi-
gent, as the sun scatters his beams over the
bosom of the whole earth, did so order that, as
long as every man was permitted to partake,
the bosom of heaven was open ; but when man
gathered them into single handfiils and made
them impropriate, God gathered his hand into
his bosom, and bound the heavens with ribs of
brass, and the earth with decrees of iron, and
the blessing reverted to him that gave it, since
they might not receive it to whom it was sent.
And in general, this is the excellency of this
mercy that all our needs are certainly supplied
and secured by a promise which God cannot
break. But he that cannot break the laws of
his own promises, can break the laws of nature
that he may perform his promise, and he will
do a miracle rather than forsake thee in thy
needs : so that our security and the relative
mercy is bound upon us by all the power and
the truth of God.

Temporal advantage is a great ingredient in
the constitution of every Christian grace. For
so the richest tissue dazzles the beholder's eye
when the smi reflects upon the metal, the sil-
ver and the gold weaved into fantastic imagery
or a wealthy plainness ; but the rich wire and
shining filaments are wrought upon cheaper
silk, the spoil of worms and flies. So is the

THE DIVINE BOUNTY. 249

embroidery of our virtue. The glories of the
spirit dwell upon the face and vestment, upon
the fringes and the borders, and there we see
the beryl and onyx, the jasper and the sar-
donyx, order and perfection, love, and peace,
and joy, mortification of the passions and rav-
ishment of the will, adherences to God and
imitation of Christ, reception and entertain-
ment of the Holy Ghost, and longings after
heaven, humility and chastity, temperance and
sobriety. These make the frame of the gar-
ment, the clothes of the soul, that it may " not
be found naked in the day of the Lord's vis-
itation." But through these rich materials a
tliread of silk is drawn, some compliance with
worms and weaker creatures, something that
shall please our bowels and make the lower
man to rejoice ; they are wrought upon secular
content and material satisfactions : and now we
cannot be happy unless we be pious ; and the
rehgion of a Christian is the greatest security,
and the most certain instrument of making a
man rich, and pleasing, and healthful, and wise,
and beloved, in the whole world.

250 RESTRAINT OF THE PASSIONS.

SYMPATHY.

A FRIEND shares my sorrow, and makes it
^■*- but a moiety ; but he swells my joy, and
makes it double. For so two channels divide
the river, and lessen it into rivulets, and make
it fordable, and apt to be drunk up at the first
revels of the Sirian star ; but two torches do
not divide, but increase the flame : and though
my tears are the sooner dried up when they
run upon my friend's cheeks in the furrows of
compassion, yet when my flame hath kindled
his lamp, we unite the glories and make them
radiant, like the golden candlesticks that burn
before the throne of God, because they shine
by numbers, by unions, and confederations of
hght and joy.

EESTRAINT OF THE PASSIONS.

O O have I seen a busy flame, sitting upon a
^ sullen coal, turn its point to all the angles
and portions of its neighborhood, and reach at
a heap of prepared straw, which, hke a bold
temptation, called it to a restless motion and
activity ; but either it was at too big a distance,
or a gentle breath from heaven diverted the

RESTRAINT OF THE PASSIONS. 251

sphere and the ray of the fire to the other side,
and so prevented the violence of the burning,
till the flame expired in a weak consumption,
and died turning into smoke, and the coolness
of death, and the harmlessness of a cinder.
And when a man's desires are winged with
sails and a lusty wind of passion, and pass on
in a smooth channel of opportunity, God often-
times hinders the lust and the impatient desire
from passing on to its port and entering into
action, by a sudden thought, by a little remem-
brance of a word, by a fancy, by a sudden dis-
ability, by unreasonable and unhkely fears, by
the sudden intervening of company, by the very
weariness of the passion, by curiosity, by want
of health, by the too great violence of the desire,
bursting itself with its ftilness into dissolution
and a remiss easiness, by a sentence of Scrip-
ture, by the reverence of a good man, or else
by the proper interventions of the spirit of gi'ace
chastising the crime, and representing its ap-
pendant mischiefs, and its constituent disorder
and irregularity : and after all this, the very
ansTiish and trouble of being; defeated in the
purpose hath rolled itself into so much uneasi-
ness and unquiet reflections, that the man is
grown ashamed and vexed into more sober
counsels.

252 THE sours MEM on Y.

THE SOUL'S MEMORY.

/^ OD will restore the soul to the body, and
" raise the body to such a perfection that it
shall be an organ fit to praise him upon ; it
shall be made spiritual to minister to the soul,
when the soul is turned into a spirit ; then the
soul shall be brought forth by angels from her
incomparable and easy bed, from her rest in
Christ's holy bosom, and be made perfect in
her being, and in all her operations. And this
shall first appear by that perfection which the
soul shall receive as instrumental to the last
judgment; for then she shall see clearly all the
records of this world, all the register of her
own memory. For all that we did in this life
is laid up in our memories ; and though dust
and forgetfulness be drawn upon them, yet
when God shall lift us from our dust, then shall
appear clearly all that we have done, written
in the tables of our conscience, which is the
soul's memory. We see many times, and in
many instances, that a great memory is hin-
dered and put out, and we thu'ty years after
come to think of something that lay so long
under a curtain ; we think of it suddenly, and
without a hne of deduction or proper conse-
quence. And all those famous memories of
Simonides and Theodectes, of Hortensius and

FEMALE PIETY. 253

Seneca, of Sceptiiis, Metrodorus, and Camea-
des, of Cyneas the ambassador of Pyrrlius, are
only the records better kept, and less disturbed
by accident and disease. For even the memory
of Herod's son, of Athens, of BathyUus, and
the dullest person now ahve, is so great, and by
God made so sure a record of all that ever he
did, that as soon as ever God shall but tune oiu-
instrument, and draw the curtains, and but
light up the candle of immortahty, there we
shall find it all, there we shall see all, and the
whole world shall see all. Then we shall be
made fit to converse with God after the man-
ner of spu'its ; we shall be like to angels.

FEMALE PIETY.

T HAVE seen a female rehgion that wholly
-*■ dwelt upon the face and tongue ; that, like
a wanton and an midressed tree, spends all its
juice in suckers and irregular branches, in
leaves and gum ; and after all such goodly out-
sides, you should never eat an apple, or be
delighted with the beauties or the perfumes of
a hopeful blossom. But the religion of this
excellent lady was of another constitution ; it
took root downward in humility, and brought
forth fruit upward in the substantial graces of
a Christian, in charity and justice, in chastity

254 FEMALE PIETY.

and modesty, in fair friendships and sweetness
of society. She had not very much of the
forms and outsides of godhness, but she was
hugely careful for the power of it, for the
moral, essential, and useful parts, such which
would make Ijer be, not seem to be, religious.

In all her religion, in all her actions of rela-
tion towards God, she had a strange evenness
and untroubled passage, sliding toward her
ocean of God and of infinity with a certain and
silent motion. So have I seen a river deep
and smooth passing with a still foot and a sober
face, and paying to the '■'■Jiscus," the great ex-
chequer of the sea, the prince of all the watery
bodies, a tribute large and fiill ; and hard by it
a little brook skipping and making a noise upon
its unequal and neighbor bottom ; and after all
its talking and braggart motion, it paid to its
common audit no more than the revenues of a
httle cloud, or a contemptible vessel. So have
I sometimes compared the issues of her religion
to the solemnities and famed outsides of an-
other's piety. It dwelt upon her spirit, and
was incorporated with the periodical work of
every day : she did not believe that religion
was intended to minister to fame and reputa-
tion, but to pardon of sins, to the pleasure of
God, and the salvation of souls. For religion
is hke the breath of heaven : if it goes abroad
into the open air, it scatters and dissolves like

FEMALE PIETY. 255

camphor ; but if it enters into a secret hollow-
ness, into a close conveyance, it is strong and
mighty, and comes forth with vigor and great
effect at the other end, at the other side of this
life, in the days of death and judgment.

The other appendage of her religion, which
also was a great ornament to all the parts of
her life, was a rare modesty and humility of
spirit, a confident despising and undervaluing
of herself. For though she had the greatest
judgment, and the gi'eatest experience of things
and persons that I ever yet knew in a person
of her youth and sex and circumstances, yet,
as if she knew nothing of it, she had the mean-
est opinion of herself; and like a fair taper,
when she shmed to all the room, yet round
about her own station she had cast a shadow
and a cloud, and she shined to eveiybody but
herself. But the perfectness of her prudence
and excellent parts could not be hid ; and all
her humihty and arts of concealment made
the virtues more amiable and illustrious. For
as pride siillies the beauty of the fairest virtues
and makes our understanding but like the craft
and learning of a devil, so humility is the
gi'eatest eminency and art of publication in the
whole world ; and she, in all her arts of secrecy
and hiding her worthy things, was but " like
one that hideth the wind, and covers the oint-
ment of her right hand."

256 FEMALE PIETY.

Slie lived as we all should live, and she died
as I fain Avould die. I pi'ay God I may feel
those mercies on my death-bed that she felt,
and that I may feel the same effect of my re-
pentance which she feels of the many degrees
of her innocence. Such was her death, that
she did not die too soon ; and her life was so
useful and excellent, that she could not have
lived too long. And as now in the grave it
shall not be mquired concerning her, how long
she lived, but how well, so to us who live after
her, to suffer a longer calamity, it may be some
ease to our sorrows, and some guide to our
lives, and some security to our conditions, to
consider that God hath brought the piety of a
young lady to the early rewards of a never-
ceasing and never-dying eternity of glory : and
we also, if we live as she did, shall partake of
the same glories ; not only having the honor
of a good name, and a dear and honored mem-
ory, but the glories of these glories, the end
of all excellent labors and all prudent coun-
sels and all holy religion, even the salvation
of our souls, in that day when all the saints,
and among them this excellent woman, shall
be shown to all the world to have done more,
and more excellent things, than we know of or
can describe. Death consecrates and makes
sacred that person whose excellency was such
that they that are not displeased at the death

THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE. 257

cannot dispraise the life ; but they that mourn
sadlj, think they can never commend suffi-
ciently.

THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE.

A MAN is a bubble," said the Greek proverb ;
■^^ which Lucian represents with advantages,
and its proper circumstances, to this purpose,
saying : All the world is a storm, and men rise
up in their several generations like bubbles de-
scending " a Jove 'pluvio^'' from God and the
dew of heaven, from a tear and drop of rain,
from nature and providence ; and some of these
instantly sink into the deluge of their' first par-
ent, and are hidden in a sheet of Avater, hav-
ing had no other business in the world but to
be born, that they might be able to die ; others
float up and down two or three turns, and sud-
denly disappear and give their place to others ;
and they that live longest upon the face of the
waters are in perpetual motion, restless and
uneasy, and being cinashed with a great drop
of a cloud, sink into flatness and a froth ; the
change not being great, it being hai'dly pos-
sible it should be more a nothino; than it was
before.

So is every man : he is bom in vanity and
17

2'; 8 THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE.

sin ; he comes into the world hke morning
mushrooms, soon thrusting up their heads into
the air, and conversing with their kindred of
the same production, and as soon they turn
unto dust and forgetfiihiess ; some of them
without any other interest in the affairs of the
workl, but that they made their parents a httle
glad and very sorrowful ; others ride longer m
the storm, it may be until seven years of van-
ity be expired, and then peradventure the sun
shines hot upon their heads, and they fall into
the shades below, into the cover of death and
darkness of the grave to hide them. But if
the bubble stands the shock of a bigger drop
and outlives the chances of a child, of a care-
less nurse, of drowning in a pail of water, of
being overlaid by a sleepy servant, or such
httle accidents, then the young man dances
like a bubble empty and gay, and shines like a
dove's neck, or the image of a rainbow, which
hath no substance, and whose very imagery
and colors are fantastical; and so he dances
out the gayety of his youth, and is all the
wliile in a storm, and endures only because
he is not knocked on the head by a drop of
bigger rain, or crushed by the pressure of a
load of indigested meat, or quenched by the
disorder of an ill-placed humor; and to pre-
serve a man alive, in the midst of so many
chances and hostilities, is as great a mu'acle as

THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE. 259

to create him; to preserve him from rushing
into nothing, and at first to draw him up from
nothing, were equally the issues of an almighty
power.

And therefore the wise men of the world
have contended who shall best fit man's con-
dition with words signif)ang his vanity and
snort abode. Homer calls a man "a leaf," the
smallest, the weakest piece of a short-lived,
unsteady plant. Pindar calls him " the dream
of a shadow " ; another, " the dream of a shad-
ow of smoke." But St. James spake by a
more excellent spirit, saying, " Our life is but
a vapor," drawn from the earth by a celestial
influence, made of smoke, or the fighter parts
of water, tossed with eveiy wind, moved by
the motion of a superior body, without \drtue
in itself, lifted up on high or left below, accord-
ing as it pleases the sun, its foster-father. But
it is lighter yet. It is but " appearing " ; a
fantastic vapor, an apparition, nothing real ; it
is not so much as a mist, not the matter of
a shower, nor substantial enough to make a
cloud ; but it is like Cassiopeia's chaii*, or
Pelops's shoulder, or the circles of heaven, " ap-
pearing," for which you cannot have a word
that can signify a verier nothing.

And yet the expression is one degree more
made diminutive ; a vapor, and fantastical, or
a mere appearance, and this but "for a httle

260 THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE.

while " neither; the very dream, the phantasm
disappears in a small time, " hke the shadow
that departeth, or like a tale that is told, or as
a dream when one awaketh." A man is so
vain, so unfixed, so perishing a creature, that
he cannot long last in the scene of fancy ; a
man goes off and is forgotten like the dream
of a distracted person. The sum of all is this :
that thou art a man, than whom there is not in
the world any greater instance of heights and
declensions, of lights and shadows, of misery
and folly, of laughter and tears, of groans and
death.

And because this consideration is of great
usefulness and great necessity to many pur-
poses of wisdom and the spirit, all the succession
of time, all the changes in nature, all the vari-
eties of light and darkness, the thousand thou-
sands of accidents in the world, and eveiy con-
tingency to every man and to every creature
doth preach our funeral sermon, and calls us to
look and see how the old sexton. Time, throws
up the earth and digs a grave where we must
lay our sins or our sorrows, and sow our bodies,
till they rise again in a fair or in an intoler-
able eternity. Every revolution which the sun
makes about the world divides between life
and death ; and death possesses both those
portions by the next morrow ; and we are
dead to all those months which we have al-

THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE. 261

ready lived, and we shall never live them
over again ; and stUl God makes little periods
of our age.

First we change our world when we are
born and feel the warmth of the sun. Then
we sleep and enter into the image of death, in
which state we are unconcerned in all the
changes of the world ; and if our mothers or
our nurses die, or a wild boar destroy our vine-
yards, or our king be sick, we regard it not,
but durino; that state are as disinterested as if
our eyes Avere closed with the clay that weeps
in the bowels of the earth. At the end of
seven years our teeth fall and die before us,
representing a formal prologue to a tragedy ;
and still every seven years it is odd but we
shall finish the last scene ; and when nature,
or chance, or vice takes our body in pieces,
weakening some parts and loosening others, we
taste the grave, and the solemnities of our own
funerals, first, in those parts that ministered to
vice, and next, in them that served for orna-
ment ; and in a short time even they that
served for necessity become useless and en-
tansled* like the wheels of a broken clock.

Baldness is but a dressing to our funerals,
the proper ornament of mourning, and of a
person entered very far into the regions and
possession of death ; and we have many more
of the same signification ; gray hairs, rotten

262 THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE.

teeth, dim eyes, trembling joints, short breath,
stiff hmbs, wrinkled skin, short memory, de-
cayed appetite. Every day's necessity calls
for a reparation of that portion which death
fed on all night, when we lay in his lap and
slept in his outer chambers. The very spirits
of a man prey upon the daily portion of bread
and flesh, and every meal is a rescue fi'om one
death, and lays up for another ; and while we
think a thought we die ; and the clock strikes,
and reckons on our portion of eternity ; we
form our words with the breath of our nostrils ;
we have the less to live upon for every word
we speak.

Thus nature calls us to meditate of death by
those things which are the instruments of act-
ing it; and God, by all the variety of his prov-
idence, makes us see death everywhere, in all
variety of circumstances, and dressed up for
all the fancies and the expectation of every
single person. Nature hath given us one har-
vest every year, but deatli hath two ; and the
spring and the autumn send throngs of men
and women to charnel-houses ; and all the
summer long, men are recovering from the
evils of the spring, till the dog-days come and
the Sirian star makes the summer deadly; and
the fruits of autumn are laid up for all the
year's provision, and the man that gathers
them eats and surfeits and dies, and needs

THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE. 263

them not, and himself is laid up for eternity ;
and he that escapes till winter, only stays for
another opportunity, which the distempers of
that quarter minister to him with great variety.
Thus death reigns in all the portions of our
time. The autumn with its fruits provides dis-
orders for us, and the winter's cold turns them
into sharp diseases, and the spring brings flow-
ers to strew our hearse, and the summer oives
green turf and brambles to bind upon our
graves. Calentures and smfeit, cold and agues,
are the four quarters of the year, and all minis-
ter to death ; and vou can 2:0 no whither but
you tread upon a dead man's bones.

The wild fellow in Petronius that escaped
upon a broken table fi-om the fiiries of a ship-
wreck, as he was sunning himself upon the
rocky shore espied a man rolling upon his
floating bed of waves, ballasted Avith sand in
the folds of his garment, and carried by his
civil enemy, the sea, towards the shore to
find a grave ; and it cast him into some sad
thoughts : that peradventure this man's wife
in some part of the continent, safe and wann,
looks next month for the good man's return ;
or it may be his son knows nothing of the tem-
pest ; or his father thinks of that affectionate
kiss, which still is warm upon the good old
man's cheek, ever since he took a kind fare-
well, and he weeps Avith joy to think how

264 THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE.

blessed he shall be when his beloved boy
returns into the circle of his father's arms.
These are the thoughts of mortals, this the
end and sum of all their designs ; a dark
night and an ill guide, a boisterous sea and a
broken cable, a hard rock and a rough wind,
dashed in pieces the fortune of a whole family ;
and they that shall weep loudest for the acci-
dent are not yet entered into the storm, and
yet have suffered shipwreck. Then looking
upon the carcass, he knew it, and found it to
be the master of the ship, who the day before
cast up the accounts of his patrimony and his
trade, and named the day when he thovight to
be at home. See how the man swims who
was so angry two days since ; his passions are
becalmed by the storm, his accounts are cast
up, his cares at an end, his voyage done,
and his gains are the strange events of death,
which, whether they be good or evil, the men
that are alive seldom trouble themselves con-
cerning the interest of the dead.

But seas alone do not break our vessel in
pieces ; everywhere we may be shipwrecked.
A vahant general, when he is to reap the har-
vest of his crowns and triumphs, fights unpros-
perously, or falls into a fever with joy and
wine, and changes his laurel into cypress, his
triumphant chariot to a hearse ; dying the
night before he was appointed to perish in

THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE. 265

the drunkenness of his festival joys. It was
a sad arrest of the loosenesses and wilder feasts
of the French court, when their king, Henry
the Second, was killed really by the sportive
image of a fight. And many brides have died
under the hands of paranymphs and maidens,
dressing them for the new and undiscerned
chains of marriage. Some have been paying
their vows, and giving thanks for a prosperous
return to their own house, and the roof hath
descended- upon their heads, and turned their
loud rehgion into the deeper sUence of a grave.
And how many teeming mothers have rejoiced,
and pleased themselves in becoming channels
of blessing to a family ; and the midwife hath
quickly bound their heads and feet, and car-
ried them forth to bvirial. Or else the birth-
day of an heir hath seen the coifin of the father
brought into the house, and the divided mother
hath been forced to travail twice, with a pain-
ful birth, and a sadder death.

There is no state, no accident, no circum-
stance of our life but it hath been soured by
some sad instance of a dying friend ; a friendly
meeting often ends in some sad mischance and
makes an eternal parting ; and when the poet
^schylus was sitting under the walls of his
house, an eagle hovering over his bald head
mistook it for a stone, and let fall his oyster,
hoping there to break the shell, but pierced the
poor man's skull.

266 THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE.

Death meets us everywhere, and is pro-
cured by every instrument, and in all chances,
and enters in at many doors ; by violence and
secret influence, by the aspect of a star and the
scent of a mist, by the emissions of a cloud and
the meeting of a vapor, by the fall of a chariot
and the stumbling at a stone, by a full meal or
an empty stomach, by watching at the wine
or by watching at prayers, by the sun or the
moon, by a heat or a cold, by sleepless nights or
sleeping days, by water frozen into the hardness
and sharpness of a dagger, or water thawed
into the floods of a river, by a hair or a raisin,
by violent motion or sitting still, by severity or
dissolution, by God's mercy or God's anger, by
everything in providence and everything in
manners, by everything in nature and by
everything in chance. " Eripitur persona,
manet res'''' ; we take pains to heap up things
useful to our life, and get our death in the
purchase ; and the person is snatched away,
and the goods remain. And all this is the
law and constitution of nature ; it is a punish-
ment to our sins, the unalterable event of
providence, and the decree of heaven. The
chains that confine us to this condition are
strong as destiny and immutable as the eternal
laws of God.

I have conversed with some men who re-
joiced in the death or calamity of others, and

TEE SHORTNESS OF LIFE. 267

accounted it as a judgment upon tliem for being
on the other side and against them in the con-
tention ; but within the revolution of a few
months, the same man met with a more un-
easy and unhandsome death ; which, when I
saw, I wept and was afraid ; for I knew it
must be so with all men, for we also shall
die, and end our quarrels and contentions bj
passing to a final sentence.

It is a mighty change that is made by the
death of every person, and it is visible to us
who are ahve. Reckon but fi'om the spright-
fulness of youth and the fair cheeks and the
full eyes of childhood, from the ^^gorousness
and strong flexure of the joints of five-and-
twenty to the hollowness and dead paleness,
to the loathsomeness and horror of a three
days' burial, and we shall perceive the distance
to be very great and very strange. But so
have I seen a rose newly springing from the
clefls of its hood, and at first it was as fair as
the morning, and full with the dew of heaven
as a lamb's fleece ; but when a rvider breath
had forced open its virgin modesty and dis-
mantled its too youthful and unripe retire-
ments, it began to put on darkness and to
decline to softness and the symptoms of a
sickly age ; it bowed the head and broke its
stalk, and at night, ha\nng lost some of its
leaves and all its beautv, it fell into the portion
of weeds and outworn faces.

268 THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE.

The same is the portion of every man and
every woman ; the heritage of worms and ser-
pents, rottenness and cold dishonor, and our
beauty so changed that our acquaintance quick-
ly know us not ; and that change mingled with
so much horror, or else meets so with our fears
and weak discoursings, that they who six hours
ago tended upon us, either with charitable or
ambitious services, cannot without some regret
stay in the room alone where the body lies
stripped of its life and honor. I have read of
a fair young German gentleman, who, living,
often refused to be pictured, but put off the
importunity of his friends' desire by giving
way that after a few days' bvirial they might
send a painter to his vault, and, if they saw
cause for it, draw the image of his death unto
the hfe. They did so, and found his face half
eaten, and his midriff and backbone full of ser-
pents ; and so he stands pictvired amongst his
armed ancestors. So does the fairest beauty
change ; and it will be as bad with you and
me ; and then what servants shall we have to
wait upon us in the grave ? what friends to
visit us ? what officious people to cleanse away
the moist and unwholesome cloud reflected
upon our faces from the sides of the weeping
vaults, which are the longest weepers for our
ftineral ?

A man may read a sermon, the best and

THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE. 269

most passionate that ever man preached, if he
shall but enter into the sepulchres of kings.
In the same Escurial where the Spanish princes
live in greatness and power, and decree war
or peace, they have wisely placed a cemetery,
where their ashes and their glory shall sleep
till time shall be no more ; and where our
kings have been crowned, their ancestors lie
interred, and they must walk over their grand-
sire's head to take his crown. Thei^e is an
acre sown with royal seed, the copy of the
greatest change, from rich to naked, from
ceiled roofs to arched coffins, from living like
gods to die like men. There is enovigh to cool
the flames of lust, to abate the heights of pride,
to appease the itch of covetous desires, to sully
and dash out the dissembling colors of a lustful,
artificial, and imaginary beauty. There the
warlike and the peaceful, the fortunate and the
miserable, the beloved and the despised princes
mingle their dust, and pay down their symbol
of mortality, and tell all the Avorld that, when
we die, our ashes shall be equal to kings', and
our accounts easier, and our pains for our
crowns shall be less.

Let no man extend his thouo-hts, or let his
hopes wander towards future and far-distant
events and accidental contingencies. This day
is mine and yours, but ye know not what shall
be on the morrow : and every morning creeps

270 THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE.

out of a dark cloud, leavino; behind it an igno-
ranee and silence deep as midnight, and undis-
cerned as are the phantasms that make a chris-
om child to smile ; so that we cannot discern
what comes hereafter, unless we had a light
from heaven brighter than the vision of an
angel, even the spirit of prophecy. Without
revelation we cannot tell whether we shall eat
to-morrow, or whether a squinancy shall choke
us ; and it is written in the unrevealed folds of
divine predestination, that many who are this
day alive shall to-morrow be laid upon the cold
earth, and the women shall weep over their
shroud, and dress them for their funeral.

This descending to the grave is the lot of
all men ; neither doth God respect the person
of any man. The rich is not protected for
favor, nor the poor for pity ; the old man is not
reverenced for his age, nor the infant regarded
for his tenderness ; youth and beauty, learn-
ing and prudence, wit and strength lie down
equally in the dishonors of the grave. All
men, and all natures, and all persons resist the
addresses and solemnities of death, and strive
to preserve a miserable and unpleasant life ;
and yet they all sink down and die. For so
have I seen the pillars of a building assisted
with artificial props bending under the pres-
sure of a roof, and jDertinaciously resisting the
infallible and prepared ruin, till the determined

THE MISERIES OF LIFE. 271

day conies, and then the burden sunk upon the
pillars, and disordered the aids and auxiliary
rafters into a common ruin and a ruder erave.
So are the desires and weak arts of man ; with
little aids and assistances of care and physic we
strive to support our decaying bodies, and to
put off the evil day ; but quickly that day will
come, and then neither angels nor men can
rescue us from our grave ; but the roof sinks
down upon the walls, and the walls descend to
the foundation ; and the beauty of the face
and the dishonors of the belly, the discerning
head and the servile feet, the thinkincr heart
and the working hand, the eyes and the guts
together shall be crushed into the confusion of
a heap, and dwell with creatures of an equivo-
cal production, with worms and serpents, the
sons and daughters of our own bones, in a
house of dirt and darkness.

THE MISERIES OF LIFE.

TTOW few men in the world are prosperous !
■*-■- What an infinite number of slaves and
beggars, of persecuted and oppressed people,
fill all comers of the earth with groans, and
heaven itself with weeping, prayers, and sad
remembrances ! How many provinces and king-

272 THE MISERIES OF LIFE.

doms are afflicted by a violent war, or made
desolate by popular diseases ! Some whole
countries are remarked with fatal evils, or
periodical sicknesses. Grand Cairo in Egypt
feels the plague every three years returning
like a quartan ague, and destroying many thou-
sands of persons. All tlie inhabitants of Arabia
the Desert are in continual fear of being buried
in huge heaps of sand ; and therefore dwell in
tents and ambulatory houses, or retire to un-
fruitful mountains, to prolong an uneasy and
wilder life. And all the countries round about
the Adriatic Sea feel such violent convulsions
by tempests and intolerable earthquakes, that
sometimes whole cities find a tomb, and every
man sinks with his own house made ready to
become his monument, and his bed is crushed
into the disorders of a grave.

Or if you please in charity to visit an hospi-
tal, which is indeed a map of the whole world,
there you shall see the effects of Adam's sin,
and the imins of human nature ; bodies laid up
in heaps, like the bones of a destroyed town ;
men whose souls seem to be borrowed, and
are kept there by art and the force of medi-
cine, whose miseries are so great that few
people have charity or humanity enough to
visit them, fewer have the heart to dress them ;
and we pity them in civility or with a transient
prayer, but we do not feel their sorrows by the

THE MISERIES OF LIFE. 273

mercies of a religious pity ; and therefore, as
we leave their sorrows in many degrees unre-
lieved and uneased, so we contract, by our
unmercifulness, a guilt by which ourselves be-
come liable to the same calamities. Those
many that need pity, and those infinities of
people that refuse to pity, are miserable upon a
several charge, but yet they almost make up
all mankind.

But these evils are notorious and confessed ;
even they also whose fehcity men stare at and
admire, besides their splendor and the sharp-
ness of their light, will, with their appendant
sorrows, wring a tear from the most resolved
eye : for not only the winter quarter is full of
storms and cold and darkness, but the beaute-
ous spring hath blasts and sharp frosts; the
fruitful teeming summer is melted with heat,
and burnt with the kisses of the sun, her friend,
and choked with dust; and the rich autumn
is full of sickness ; and we are wear}^ of that
which we enjoy, because sorrow is its bigger
portion. For look upon kings and conquerors.
I will not tell that many of them fall into the
condition of servants, and their subjects rule
over them, and stand upon the ruins of their
famihes, and that to such persons the sorrow
is bigger than usually happens in smaller for-
tunes. But let us suppose them still conquer-
ors, and see what a goodly purchase they get,
18

274 THE MISERIES OF LIFE.

by all their pains, and amazing fears, and con-
timml dangers. They carry their arms beyond
Ister, and pass the Euphrates, and bind the
Germans with the bounds of the river Rhine :
I speak in the style of the Roman greatness ;
for nowadays the biggest fortune swells not
beyond the limits of a petty provmce or two,
and a hill confines the progress of their pros-
perity, or a river checks it. But whatsoever
tempts the pride and vanity of ambitious per-
sons, is not so big as the smallest star which
we see scattered in disorder and unregarded
upon the pavement and floor of heaven. And
if we would suppose the pismires had but our
understanding, they also would have the meth-
od of a man's greatness, and divide their little
molehills into provinces and exarchates ; and if
they also grew as vicious and as miserable, one
of their princes would lead an army out, and
kill his neighbor-ants, that he might reign over
the next handful of a turf. But then if we
consider at what price and with what felicity all
this is purchased, the sting of the painted snake
will quickly appear, and the fairest of their
fortunes will properly enter into this account
of human infelicities.

We must look for prosperity, not in palaces
or courts of princes, not in the tents of con-
querors, or in the gayeties of fortunate and
prevailing sinners ; but something rather in

TEE MISERIES OF LIFE. 275

the cottages of honest, innocent, and contented
persons, whose niind is no bigger than their for-
tune, nor their virtue less than their security.
As for others, whose fortune looks bigger, and
allures fools to follow it, like the wandering
fires of the night, till they run into rivers, or
are broken upon rocks with staring and run-
ning after them, they are all in the condition of
Marius, than whose condition nothing was more
constant, and nothing more mutable. If we
reckon them amongst the happy, they are the
most happy men ; if we reckon them amongst
the miserable, they are the most miserable.
For just as is a man's condition, great or little,
so is the state of his misery. All have their
share ; but kings and princes, great generals
and consuls, rich men and mighty, as they
have the biggest business and the biggest
charge, and are answerable to God for the
greatest accounts, so they have the biggest
trouble ; that the uneasiness of their appen-
dage may divide the good and evil of the
world, making the poor man's fortune as eli-
gible as the greatest; and also restraining the
vanity of man's spirit, which a great fortune is
apt to swell from a vapor to a bubble : but
God in mercy hath mingled wormwood with
their wine, and so restrained the drunkenness
and follies of prosperity.

He that is no fool, but can consider wisely,

276 THE MISERIES OF LIFE.

if he be in love with this world, we need not
despair but that a witty man might reconcile
him with tortures, and make him think chari-
tably of the rack, and be brought to dwell with
vipers and dragons, and entertain his guests
with the shrieks of mandrakes, cats, and
screech-owls, with the fihng of iron, and the
harshness of rending silk, or to admire the
harmony that is made by a herd of evening
wolves, when they miss their draught of blood
in their midnight revels. The groans of a man
in a fit of the stone are worse than all these ;
and the distractions of a troubled conscience
are worse than those groans : and yet a care-
less merry sinner is worse than all that.

But if we could fi'om one of the battlements
of heaven espy how many men and women at
this time lie fainting and dying for want of
bread, how many young men are hewn down
by the sword of war, how many poor orphans
are now weeping over the graves of their
father, by whose life they were enabled to
eat ; if we could but hear how many mariners
and passengers are at this present in a storm,
and shriek out because their keel dashes against
a rock or bulges under them, how many peo-
ple there are that weep with want and are
mad with oppression, or are desperate by too
quick a sense of a constant infelicity ; in all
reason we should be glad to be out of the noise

REASON AND DISCRETION. 277

and participation of so many evils. This is a
place of sorrows and tears, of great evils and a
constant calamity : let us remove from hence,
at least in affections and preparation of mind.

REASON AND DISCRETION.

TT/'E must not think that the life of a man
' * begins when he can feed himself or walk
alone, when he can fight or beget his like ; for
so he is contemporary with a camel or a cow :
but he is first a man, when he comes to a cer-
tain steady use of reason, according to his pro-
portion ; and when that is, all the world of men
cannot tell precisely. Some are called at age at
fourteen, some at one-and-twenty, some never ;
but all men late enough, for the life of a man
comes upon him slowly and insensibly. But as
when the sun approaching towards the gates
of the morning, he first opens a httle eye of
heaven and sends away the spirits of darkness,
and gives light to a cock, and calls up the lark
to matins, and by and by gilds the fringes of a
cloud, and peeps over the eastern hills, thrust-
ing out his golden horns, like those which
decked the brows of Moses when he was forced
to wear a veil, because himself had seen the
face of God ; and still while a man tells the

278 REASON AND DISCRETION.

story, the sun gets up higher, till he shows a
fair face and a full light, and then he shines
one whole day, under a cloud often, and some-
times weeping great and little showers, and sets
quickly : so is a man's reason and his life. He
first begins to perceive himself to see or taste,
making little reflections upon his actions of
sense, and can discourse of flies and dogs, shells
and play, horses and liberty : but when he is
strong enough to enter into arts and little insti-
tutions, he is at first entertained with trifles
and impertinent things, not because he needs
them, but because his understanding is no big-
ger, and little images of things are laid before
him, like a cockboat to a whale, only to play
withal : but before a man comes to be wise, he
is half dead with gouts and consvimption, with
catarrhs and aches, with sore eyes and a worn-
out body. So that if we must not reckon the
life of a man but by the accounts of his reason,
he is long before his soul be dressed ; and he is
not to be called a man without a wise and an
adox'ned soul, a soul at least furnished with
what is necessary towards his well-being. But
by the time his soul is thus furnished, his body
is decayed ; and then you can hardly reckon
him to be aHve, when his body is possessed by
so many degrees of death.

But there is yet another arrest. At first he
wants strength of body, and then he wants the

REASON AND DISCRETION. 279

use of reason ; and when that is come, it is ten
to one but he stops by the impediments of vice,
and wants the strength of the spirit ; and we
know that bodj and soul and spirit are the
constituent parts of every Christian man. And
now let us consider what that thmg; is which
we call years of discretion. The youno- man
is past his tutors, and arrived at the bondage
of a caitiff spirit ; he is run from discipline,
and is let loose to passion ; the man by this
time hath wit enough to choose his vice, to act
his lust, to court his mistress, to talk confi-
dently and ignorantly and perpetually, to de-
spise his betters, to deny nothing to liis appe-
tite, to do things that, when he is indeed a
man, he must forever be ashamed of. For this
is all the discretion that most men show in the
first stage of their manhood ; they can discern
good from evil ; and they prove their skill by
leaving all that is good, and wallowing in the
e\dls of folly and an unbridled appetite. And
by this time the young man hath contracted
vicious habits, and is a beast in manners, and
therefore it will not be fitting to reckon the be-
ginning of his life ; he is a fool in his under-
standing, and that is a sad death ; and he is
dead in trespasses and sins, and that is a sad-
der : so that he hath no life but a natural, the
hfe of a beast or a tree ; in all other capacities
he is dead ; he neither hath the mtellectual nor

280 CHARITY.

the spiritual life, neither the life of a man nor
of a Christian ; and this sad truth lasts too long.
For old age seizes upon most men while they
still retain the minds of boys and vicious youth,
doing actions from principles of great folly and
a mightv icrnorance, admirino; things useless
and hurtful, and filling up all the dimensions
of their abode with businesses of empty affairs,
being at leisure to attend no virtue. They can-
not pray, because they are busy and because
they are passionate ; they cannot communi-
cate, because they have quarrels and intrigues
of perplexed causes, complicated hostilities, and
things of the world ; and therefore they can-
not attend to the things of God, little consider-
ing that they must find a time to die in ; when
death comes, they must be at leisure for that.
Such men are like sailors loosing from a port,
and tost immediately with a perpetual tempest
lasting till their cordage crack, and either they
sink or return back again to the same place :
they did not make a voyage, though they were
long at sea.

CHARITY.

/CHARITY, with its twin-daughters, alms
^ and forgiveness, is especially effectual for

CHARITY. 281

the procuring God's mercies in the day and
the manner of our death. Repentance with-
out ahns is dead and without wings, and can
never soar upwards to the element of love.
A long experience hath observed God's mer-
cies to descend upon charitable people, like
the dew upon Gideon's fleece, when all the
world was dry. When faith fails, and chas-
tity is useless, and temperance shall be no
more, then charity shall bear you upon wings
of cherubim to the eternal mountain of the
Lord.

I do not mean this should only be a death-
bed charity, any more than a death-bed repent-
ance ; but it ought to be the charity of our
hfe and healthful years, a parting with portions
of our goods then when we can keep them.
We must not first kindle our licrhts when we
are to descend into our houses of darkness, or
bring a glaring torch suddenly to a dark room
that will amaze the eye and not delight it, or
instruct the body; but if our tapers have, m
their constant course, descended into theh
grave, crowned all the way with light, then
let the death-bed charity be doubled, and the
light burn brightest when it is to deck our
hearse.

282 IMMODERATE GRIEF.

TIME.

TT is very remarkable that God who giveth
^ plenteovTsly to all creatures, — he hath scat-
tered the firmament with stars, as a man sows
corn in his fields, in a multitude bigger than
the capacities of human order ; he hath made so
much variety of creatures, and gives us great
choice of meats and drinks, although any one
of both Idnds would have served our needs ;
and so in all instances of nature, — yet in the
distribution of our time, God seems to be
straight-handed ; and gives it to us, not as
nature gives us rivers, enough to drown us,
but drop by drop, minute after minute ; so that
we never can have two minutes together, but
he takes away one when he gives us another.
This should teach us to value our time since
God so values it, and by his so small distribu-
tion of it tells us it is the most precious thing
we have.

IMMODERATE GRIEF.

O OLEMN and appointed mournings are good
^ expressions of our dearness to the departed
soul, and of his worth and our value of him ;
and it hath its praise in nature and in man-

IMMODERATE GRIEF. 283

ners and public customs. Something is to be
given to custom, something to fame, to nature,
and to civihties, and to the honor of the de-
ceased fi-iends ; for that man is esteemed to die
miserable for whom no friend or relative sheds
a tear or pays a solemn sigh. I desire to die
a drv death, but am not very desirous to have
a dry funeral. Some shoM^ers sprinkled upon
my grave would do well and comely; and a
soft shower to tm-n those flowers into a sprmg-
ing memory or a fair rehearsal, that I may not
go forth of my doors as my servants carry the
entrails of beasts.

But that which is to be faulted in this partic-
ular is when the grief is immodei'ate and un-
reasonable ; and Paula Romana deserved to
have felt the weight of St. Hierom's severe
reproof, when at the death of every of her
children she almost wept herself into her
grave. But it is worse yet when people, by
an ambitious and a pompous sorrow, and by
ceremonies invented for the ostentation of their
grief, fill heaven and earth with exclamations,
and grow troublesome because their friend is
happy or themselves want his company. It is
certainly a sad thing in nature to see a friend
trembling with a palsy, or scorched with fevers,
or dried up like a potsherd with immoderate
heats, and rolling upon his uneasy bed without
sleep, which cannot be invited with music, or

284 THE EPHESIAN MATRON.

pleasant murmiu^s, or a decent stillness : noth-
ing but the servants of cold death, poppy and
weariness, can tempt the eyes to let their cur-
tains down, and then they sleep only to taste
of death, and make an essay of the shades be-
low : and yet we weep not here. The period
and opportunity for tears we choose when our
friend is fallen asleep, when he hath laid his
neck upon the lap of his mother, and let his
head down to be raised up to heaven. This
grief is ill-placed and indecent. But many
times it is worse ; and it hath been observed
that those greater and stormy passions do so
spend the whole stock of grief that they pres-
ently admit a comfort and contraiy affection ;
while a sorrow that is even and temperate goes
on to its period with expectation and the dis-
tances of a just time.

THE EPHESIAN MATEON.

npHE Ephesian woman, that the soldier told
-*- of in Petronius, was the talk of all the town,
and the rarest example of a dear affection to
her husband. She descended with the corpse
into the vault, and there being attended with
her maiden, resolved to weep to death, or die
with famine or a distempered sorrow ; from

THE EPHESIAN MATRON. 285

which resolution nor liis nor her friends, nor
the reverence of the principal citizens, who
used the entreaties of then- charity and their
power, could persuade her. But a soldier that
watched seven dead bodies hanging upon trees
just over against this monument, crept in, and
awhile stared upon the silent and comely dis-
orders of the sorrow ; and having let the won-
der awhile breathe out at each other's eyes, at
last he fetched his supper and a bottle of wine,
with purpose to eat and drink, and still to feed
himself with that sad prettmess. His pity and
first draught of wine made him bold and curi-
ous to try if the maid would drink ; who, hav-
ing many hours since felt her resolution faint
as her wearied body, took his kindness ; and
the light returned into her eyes, and danced
like boys in a festival ; and fearing lest the per-
tinaciousness of her mistress's sorrows should
cause her evil to revert, or her shame to ap-
proach, assayed whether she would endure to
hear an argument to persuade her to drink and
live. The violent passion had laid all her
spirits in wildness and dissolution, and the maid
found them willing to be gathered into order at
the arrest of any new object, being weary
of the first, of which, like leeches, they had
sucked their fill, till they fell down and burst.
The weeping woman took her cordial, and was
not angry with her maid, and heard the soldier

286 THE EPEESIAN MATRON.

talk. And he was so pleased with the change,
that he, who first loved the silence of the sor-
row, was more in love with the music of her
returning voice, especially which himself had
strung and put in tune ; and the man began
to talk amorously, and the woman's weak head
and heart were soon possessed with a little
wine, and grew gay, and talked, and fell in
love ; and that verv night, in the morning; of
her passion, in the grave of her husband, in
the pomps of mourning, and in her funeral
garments, married her new and stranger guest.
For so the wild foragers of Lybia being
spent with heat, and dissolved by the too fond
kisses of the sun, do melt with their common
fires, and die with faintness, and descend with
motions slow and unable to the little brooks
that descend from heaven in the wilderness ;
and when they drink, they return into the
vigor of a new life, and contract strange mar-
riages ; and the lioness is courted by a panther,
and she listens to his love, and conceives a
monster that all men call unnatural, and the
daughter of an equivocal passion and of a sud-
den refreshment. And so also was it in the
cave at Ephesus ; for by this time the soldier
began to think it was fit he should return to
his watch, and observe the dead bodies he had
in charge ; but Avhen he ascended from his
mourning bridal chamber, he found that one of

TEE EPHESIAN MATRON. 287

the bodies was stolen by the fi-iends of the
dead, and that he was fallen into an evil con-
dition, because by the laws of Ephesus his
body was to be fixed in the place of it. The
poor man returns to his woman, cries out bit-
terly, and in her presence resolves to die to
prevent his death, and in secret to prevent his
shame. But now the woman's love was rao-ino-
like her former sadness, and grew witty, and
she comforted her sokher, and persuaded him
to Hve, lest by losing him, who had brought
her fi-om death and a more grievous sorrow,
she should return to her old solemnities of dy-
ing, and lose her honor for a dream, or the
reputation of her constancy without the change
and satisfaction of an enjoyed love. The man
would fain have lived, if it had been possible ;
and she found out this way for him : that he
should take the body of her first husband,
whose funeral she had so strangely mom-ned,
and put it upon the gallows in the place of the
stolen thief. He did so, and escaped the pres-
ent danger, to possess a love Avhich might
change as violently as her grief had done.

But so have I seen a crowd of disordered
people rush violently and in heaps till their
utmost border was restrained by a wall, or had
spent the fury of their first fluctuation and wa-
tery progress, and by and by it returned to the
contrary with the same earnestness, only be-

288 EDUCATION.

cause it was violent and ungoverned. A rag-
ing passion is this crowd, which, when it is not
under disciphne and the conduct of reason, and
the proportions of temperate humanity, runs
passionately the way it happens, and by and
by as greedily to another side, being swayed
by its own weight, and driven anywhither by
chance, in all its pursuits having no rule but
to do all it can, and spend itself in haste, and
expire with some shame and much indecency.

EDUCATION.

/OTHERWISE do fathers, and otherwise do
^-^ mothers handle their children. These
soften them with kisses and imperfect noises,
with the pap and breast-milk of soft endear-
ments ; they rescue them from tutors, and snatch
them from discipline ; they desire to keep them
fat and warm, and their feet dry, and their
bellies full ; and then the children govern and
cry, and prove fools and troublesome, so long
as the feminine republic does endure. But
fathers, because they design to have their chil-
dren wise and valiant, apt for counsel or for
arms, send them to severe governments, and
tie them to study, to hard labor, and afflictive
contingencies. They rejoice when the bold

EDUCATION. 289

boy strikes a lion with his hunting-spear, and
shrinks not when the beast comes to affright
his early courage. Softness is for slaves and
beasts, for minstrels and useless persons, for
such who cannot ascend higher than the state
of a fair ox, or a servant entertained for vainer
offices ; but the man that designs his son for
nobler emplojanents, to honors and to triumphs,
to consular dignities and presidencies of coun-
cils, loves to see him pale with study, or pant-
ing with labor, hardened with sufferance, or
eminent by dangers.

And so God dresses us for heaven. He
loves to see us struggling with a disease, and
resisting the devil, and contesting against the
weaknesses of nature, and against hope to be-
lieve in hope, resigning ourselves to God's will,
praying him to choose for us, and dying in all
things but faith and its blessed consequents ;
and the danger and the resistance shall endear
the office. For so have I known the boisterous
northwind pass through the yielding air, which
opened its bosom, and appeased its violence by
entertaining it with easy compliance in all the
regions of its reception ; but when the same
breath of heaven hath been checked with the
stiffiiess of a tower, or the united strength of a
wood, it grew mighty and dwelt there, and
made the highest branches stoop and make a

smooth path for it on the top of all its glories.
19

290 ADVANTAGES OF SICKNESS.

ADVANTAGES OF SICKNESS.

I CONSIDER one of the great felicities of
heaven consists in an immunity from sin.
Then we shall love God without mixtures of
malice ; then we shall enjoy without envy ;
then we shall see fuller vessels running over
with glory, and crowned with bigger circles ;
and this we shall beliold without spilling from
our eyes (those vessels of joy and grief) any
sign of anger, trouble, or any repining spirit.
Our passions shall be pure, our charity without
fear, our desire without lust, our possessions all
our own ; and all in the inheritance of Jesus,
in the richest soil of God's eternal kingdom.
Now half of this reason which makes heaven
so happy by being innocent, is also in the state
of sickness, making the sorrows of old age
smooth, and the groans of a sick heart apt to
be joined to the music of angels ; and though
they sound harsh to our untuned ears and dis-
composed organs, yet those accents must needs
be in themselves excellent which God loves to
hear, and esteems them as prayers and argu-
ments of pity, instruments of mercy and grace,
and preparatives to glory.

In sickness the soul begins to dress herself
for immortality. At first, she unties the strings
of vanity that made her upper garment cleave

ADVANTAGES OF SICKNESS. 291

to the world and sit uneasy. First, she puts
off the hght and fantastic summer robe of lust
and wanton appetite.

Next to this, the soul by the help of sick-
ness knocks off the fetters of pride and vainer
complacencies. Then she draws the curtains
and stops the light from coming in, and takes
the pictures down, — those fantastic images of
self-love, and gay remembrances of vain opin-
ion and popular noises. Then the spirit stoops
into the sobrieties of humble thoughts, and
feels corruption chiding the forwardness of
fancy, and allaying the vapors of conceit and
factious opinions. For humility is the soul's
grave, into which she enters, not to die, but to
mechtate and inter some of its troublesome ap-
pendages. There she sees the dust, and feels
the dishonor of the body, and reads the register
of all its sad adherences ; and then she lays by
all her vain reflections, beating upon her crys-
tal and pure mirror from the fancies of strength
and beauty, and Kttle decayed prettinesses of
the body.

Next to these, as the soul is still undressing,
she takes off" the roughness of her great and
little angers and animosities, and receives the
oil of mercies and smooth forgiveness, fair in-
terpretations and gentle answers, designs of
reconcilement and Christian atonement, in their
places. The temptations of this state, such I

292 ADVANTAGES OF SICKNESS.

mean which are proper to it, are little and
inconsiderable ; the man is apt to chide a ser-
vant too bitterly, and to be discontented with
his nurse or not satisfied with his physician,
and he rests uneasily, and (poor man !) nothing
can please him; and indeed these Uttle inde-
cencies must be cured and stopped lest they
run into an inconvenience. But sickness is in
this particular a little image of the state of
blessed souls, or of Adam's early morning in
paradise, free from the troubles of last and
violences of anger, and the intricacies of ambi-
tion or the restlessness of covetousness. For
though a man may carry all these along with
him into his sickness, yet there he will not find
them ; and in despite of all his own malice, his
soul shall find some rest from laboring in the
galleys and baser captivity of sin.

At the first address and presence of sickness,
stand still and arrest thy spirit that it may,
without amazement or affright, consider that
this was' that thou lookedst for and wert always
certain should happen, and that now thou art
to enter into the actions of a new religion, the
agony of a strange constitution ; but at no
hand suffer thy spirits to be dispersed with fear
or wildness of thought, but stay their looseness
and dispersion by a serious consideration of the
present and future employment. For so doth
the Lybian hon, spying the fierce huntsman;

DAILY PRATER. 293

he first beats himself with the strokes of his
tail and cvirls up his spirits, making them strong
with union and recollection, till, being struck
with a Mauritanian spear, he rushes forth into
his defence and noblest contention ; and either
escapes into the secrets of his own dwelling, or
else dies the bravest of the forest. Every
man, when shot with an arrow from God's
quiA^er, must then draw in all the auxiliaries
of reason, and know that then is the time to
try his strength and to reduce the words of his
religion into action, and consider that, if he
behaves himself weakly and timorously, he suf-
fers never the less of sickness ; but if he re-
turns to health, he carries along with him the
mark of a coward and a fool ; and if he de-
scends into his grave, he enters into the state
of the faithless and unbehevers. Let him set
his heart firm upon this resolution : " I must
bear it inevitably, and I will, by God's grace,
do it nobly."

DAILY PRAYER.

CHORT passes, quick ejections, concise forms
^ and remembrances, holy breathings, prayers
like little posies, may be sent forth without
number on every occasion, and God will note

294 TOLERATION.

them in his book. But all that have a care to
walk with God fill their vessels more largely
as soon as they rise, before they begin the
work of the day, and before they lie down
again at night ; which is to observe what the
Lord appointed in the Levitical ministry, a
morning and an evening lamb to be laid upon
the altar. So with them that are not stark
irreligious, prayer is the key to open the day
and the bolt to shut in the night. But as the
skies drop the early dew and the evening dew
upon the grass, yet it would not spring and
grow green by that constant and double fall-
ing of the dew, unless some great showers at
certain seasons did supply the rest ; so the
customary devotion of prayer twice a day is
the falling of the early and the latter dew ; but
if you will increase and flourish in the works
of grace, empty the great clouds sometimes
and let them fall into a full shower of prayer ;
choose out the seasons in your own discretion
when prayer shall overflow like Jordan in the
time of harvest.

A

TOLERATION.

NY zeal is proper for religion but the zeal
of the sword and the zeal of anger ; this

TOLERATION. 295

is the bitterness of zeal, and it is a certain temp-
tation to every man against his duty ; for if the
sword turns preacher and dictates propositions
by empire instead of arguments, and engraves
them in men's hearts with a poignard, that it
shall be death to believe what I innocently and
ignorantly am persuaded of, it must needs be
unsafe to " try the spirits," to " try all things,"
to make an inquiry ; and yet without this lib-
erty no man can justify himself before God or
man, nor confidently say that his religion is
best. This is inorchnation of zeal ; for Christ,
by reproving St. Peter drawing his sword even
in the cause of Christ for his sacred and yet
injured person, teaches us not to use the sword,
though in the cause of God or for God himself.
I end with a stoiy which I find in the Jews'
books.

When Abraham sat at his tent-door, accord-
ing to his custom, waiting to entertain stran-
gers, he espied an old man stooping and leaning
on his staff, weary with age and travel, coming
towards him, who was an hundred years of age.
He received him kindly, washed Lis feet, pro-
vided supper, cavised him to sit down ; but ob-
serving that the old man ate, and prayed not,
nor begged for a blessing on his meat, he asked
him why he did not worship the God of heaven.
The old man told him that he worshipped the
fire only, and acknowledged no other God. At

296 THE PRESENCE OF GOD.

which answer Abraham grew so zealously
angry that he thrust the old man out of his
tent and exposed him to all the evils of the
night and an unguarded condition. When the
old man was gone, God called to Abraham
and asked him where the stranger was. He
replied, I thrust him away because he did not
worship thee. God answered him, I have
suffered him these hundred years, although he
dishonored me ; and couldst thou not endure
him one night when he gave thee no trouble ?
Upon this, saith the story, Abraham fetched
him back again, and gave him hospitable enter-
tainment and wise instruction. Go thou and
do likewise, and thy charity will be rewarded
by the God of Abraham.

THE PEESENCE OF GOD.

^HAT God is present in all places, that he
-*- sees every action, hears all discourses, and
understands every thought, is no strange thing
to a Christian ear who hath been taught this
doctrine, not only by right reason and the con-
sent of all the wise men in the world, but also
by God himself in holy Scripture. God is
wholly in every place, included in no place, not
bound with cords, (except those of love,) not

THE PRESENCE OF GOD. 297

divided into parts nor changeable into several
shapes, filling heaven and earth with his pres-
ent power and with his never absent nature.
So that we may imagine God to be as the air
and the sea, and we all enclosed in his circle,
wrapt up in the lap of his infinite nature ; and
we can no more be removed from the presence
of God than from our own being.

God is present by his essence, which because
it is infinite cannot be contained within the
limits of any place ; and because he is of an
essential purity and spiritual nature, he cannot
be undervalued by being supposed present in
the places of unnatural uncleanness ; because
as the sun, reflecting upon the mud of strands
and shores, is unpolluted in its beams, so is God
not dishonored when we suppose him in every
of his creatures, and in every part of every
one of them, and is still as unmixed with any
unhandsome adherence as is the soul in the
bowels of the body.

God is everywhere present by his power.
He rolls the orbs of heaven with his hand, he
fixes the earth with his foot, he guides all the
creatures with his eye, and refreshes them with
his influence ; he makes the powers of hell to
shake with his terrors, and binds the devils with
his word, and throws them out with his com-
mand, and sends the angels on embassies with
his decrees ; he hardens the joints of infants,

298 THE PRESENCE OF GOD.

and confirms the bones when thej are fashioned
beneath secretly in tlie heart. He it is that
assists at the numerous productions of fishes ;
and there is not one hollowness in the bottom
of the sea but he shows himself to be Lord of
it, by sustaining there the creatures that come
to dwell in it ; and in the wilderness, the bit-
tern and the stork, the dragon and the satyr,
the unicorn and the elk, live upon his provisions
and revere his power and feel the force of his
almightiness.

God is, by grace and benediction, specially
present in holy places, and in the solemn as-
semblies of his servants. If holy people meet
in grots and dens of the earth when persecu-
tion or a public necessity disturbs the public
order, circumstance, and convenience, God fails
not to come thither to them ; but God is also
by the same or greater reason present there
where they meet ordinarily.

God is especially present in the hearts of
his people by his Holy Spirit ; and indeed the
hearts of holy men are temples in the truth of
things, and in type and shadow they are heaven
itself; for God reigns in the hearts of his
servants ; there is his kingdom. The power
of grace hath subdued all his enemies ; there
is his power. They serve him night and day,
and give him thanks and praise ; that is his
glory. This is the religion and worship of

THE PRESENCE OF GOD. 299

God in the temple. The temple itself is the
heart of man.

God is especially present in the consciences
of all persons, good and bad, by way of testi-
mony and judgment; that is, he is there a
remembrancer to call our actions to mind, a
witness to bring them to judgment, and a judge
to acquit or condemn. And although this
manner of presence is in this life after the
manner of this life, that is, impei^fect, and we
forget many actions of om- lives, yet the great-
est changes of our state of grace or sin, our
most considerable actions, are always present,
like capital letters to an aged and dim eye ;
and at the day of judgment, God shall draw
aside the cloud and manifest this manner of his
presence more notoriously, and make it appear
that he was an observer of our very thoughts ;
and that he only laid those things by which,
because we covered with dust and negligence,
were not then discerned. But when we are
risen from our dust and imperfections, they all
appear plain and legible.

Now the consideration of this great truth is
of a very universal use in the Avhole course of
the life of a Christian. All the consequents
and effects of it are miiversal. He that re-
members that God stands a witness and a
judge, beholding every secrecy, besides his
impiety, must have put on impudence if he be

300 THE PRESENCE OF' GOD.

not mucli restrained in his temptation to sin.
He is to be feared in public, he is to be feared
in private : if you go forth, he spies you ; if
you go in, he sees you ; when you hght the
candle, he observes you ; when you put it out,
then also God marks you. Be sure that while
you are in his sight, you behave yourself as
becomes so holy a presence. But if you^ will
sin, retire yourself wisely, and go where God
cannot see ; for nowhere else can you be safe.
And certainly, if men would always actually
consider and really esteem this truth, that God
is the great eye of the world, always watching
over our actions, and an ever-open ear to hear
all our words, and an unwearied arm ever lifted
up to crush a sinner into ruin, it wou.ld be the
readiest way in the world to make sin to cease
from among; the children of men, and for men
to approach to the blessed state of the saints
in heaven, who cannot sin, for they always walk
in the presence and behold the face of God.

Let everything you see represent to your
spirit the presence, the excellency, and the
power of God, and let your conversation with
the creatures lead you unto the Creator ; for
so shall your actions be done more frequently
with an actual eye to God's presence by your
often seeino; him in the glass of the creation.
In the face of the sun you may see God's
beauty ; in the fire you may feel his heat

TEE PRESENCE OF GOD. 301

warming ; in the water his gentleness to re-
fresh you : he it is that comforts your spirits
when you have taken cordials ; it is the dew of
heaven that makes your field give you bread ;
and the breasts of God are the bottles that
minister drink to your necessities.

In your retirement make frequent colloquies
or short discoursmgs between God and thy
own soul. " Seven times a day do I praise
thee, and in the night season also I thought
upon thee while I was waking." So did David;
and every act of complaint or thanksgiving,
every act of rejoicing or of mourning, every
petition and every return of the heart in these
intercourses, is a going to God, an appearing in
his presence, and a representing him present
to thy spfrit and to thy necessity. And this
was long since by a spiritual person called
" a building to God a chapel in our heart."
It reconciles Martha's employment with Mary's
devotion, charity and religion, the necessities
of our calling and the employments of devo-
tion. For thus, in the midst of the works of
yoiu' trade, you may retire into your chapel
(your heart), and converse with God by fre-
quent addresses and returns.

Let us remember that God is in us, and that
we are in him. We are his workmanship, let
us not deface it ; we are in his presence, let us
not pollute it by unholy and impure actions.

302 QUIET RELIGION.

God is in eveiy creature ; be cruel towards
none, neither abuse any by intemperance. Re-
member that the creatures, and every member
of thy own body, is one of the lesser cabinets
and receptacles of God. They are such which
God hath blessed with his presence, hallowed
by his touch, and separated from unholy use by
makino; them belono- to his dwelling;.

He walks as in the presence of God that
converses with him in frequent prayer and
frequent communion, that runs to him in all
his necessities, that asks counsel of him in all
his doubtings, that opens all his wants to him,
that weeps before him for his sins, that asks
remedy and support for his weakness, that fears
him as a Judge, reverences him as a Lord,
obeys him as a Father, and loves him as a
Patron.

QUIET RELIGION.

TT is not altogether inconsiderable to observe
-*- that the holy Virgin came to a great perfec-
tion and state of piety by a few, and those
modest and even, exercises and external ac-
tions. St. Paul travelled over the world,
preached to the Gentiles, disputed against the
Jews, confounded heretics, wrote excellently
learned letters, suffered dangers, injuries, af-

QUIET RELIGION. 303

fronts, and persecutions to the height of won-
der, and by these violences of Hfe, action, and
patience obtained the crown of an excellent
religion and devotion. But the holy Virgin,
althouD'h she was engaged sometunes in an
active life, and in the exercise of an ordinarv
and small economy and government, or min-
istries of a family, yet she arrived to her per-
fections by the means of a quiet and silent
piety, the internal actions of love, devotion,
and contemplation ; and instructs us that not
only those who have opportunity and powers
of a magnificent religion, or a pompous charity,
or miraculous conversion of souls, or assidvious
and effectual preachings, or exterior demon-
strations of corporal mercy, shall have the
greatest crowns, and the addition of degrees
and accidental rewards ; but the silent affec-
tions, the splendors of an internal devotion,
the unions of love, humility, and obedience,
the daily offices of prayer and praises sung to
God, the acts of faith and fear, of patience and
meekness, of hope and reverence, repentance
and charity, and those graces which walk in a
veil and silence, make great ascents to God,
and as sure progress to favor and a crown, as
the more ostentatious and laborious exercises
of a more solemn relio-ion. No man needs to
complain of want of power or opportunities for
religious perfections : a devout woman in her

304 THE IMITATION OF CHRIST.

closet, praying with much zeal and affections
for the conversion of souls, is in the same order
to a " shining like the stars in glory," as he
who, by excellent discourses, puts it into a
more forward disposition to be actually per-
formed. And possibly her prayers obtained
energy and force to my sermon, and made the
ground fruitful, and the seed spring up to life
eternal. Many times God is present in the
still voice and private retirements of a quiet
religion, and the constant spiritualities of an
ordinary life ; when the loud and impetuous
winds, and the shining fires of more laborious
and expensive actions, are profitable to others
only, Kke a tree of balsam, distilling precious
liquor for others, not for its own use.

THE IMITATION OF CHRIST.

TT is reported in the Bohemian story that St.
-*- Wenceslaus, their king, one winter night
going to his devotions, in a remote church,
l^arefooted in the snow and sharpness of une-
qual and pointed ice, his servant Podavivus,
who waited upon his master's piety and en-
deavored to imitate his affections, began to
faint through the violence of the snow and
cold, till the king commanded him to follow

THE IMITATION OF CHRIST. 305

liim, and set his feet in the same footsteps
which his feet should mark for him : the ser-
vant did so, and either fancied a cure or found
one ; for he followed his prince, helped forward
with shame and zeal to his imitation and by
the forming footsteps for him in the snow. In
the same manner does the blessed Jesus ; for,
since our way is troublesome, obscure, full of
objection and danger, apt to be mistaken and
to affright our industry, he commands us to
mark his footsteps, to tread where his feet have
stood, and not only invites us forward by the
argument of his example, but he hath trodden
down much of the difficulty, and made the way
easier and fit for our feet. For he knows our
infirmities, and himself hath felt their experi-
ence in all things but in the neighborhoods of
sin ; and therefore he hath proportioned a way
and a path to our strengths and capacities, and,
like Jacob, hath marched softly and in even-
ness with the children and the cattle, to enter-
tain us by the comforts of his company and
the influences of a perpetual guide.

He that gives alms to the poor, takes Jesus
by the hand ; he that patiently endures injuries
and affronts, helps him to bear his cross ; he
that comforts his brother in affliction, gives an
amiable kiss of peace to Jesus ; he that bathes
his own and his neighbor's sins in tears of
penance and compassion, washes his Master's
20

306 THE IMITATION OF CHRIST.

feet : we lead Jesus into the recesses of our
heart by holy meditations ; and we enter into
his heart when we express him in our actions :
for so the apostle says, " He that is^ in Christ,
walks as he also walked." But thus the actions
of our life relate to him by way of worship and
rehgion ; but the use is admirable and effectual
when our actions refer to him as to our copy,
and we transcribe the original to the life.

THE END.

CAMBRIDGE : PRINTED BY H. 0. HOUGHTON.

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